Phishing is the term used to describe the theft of important information about your personal identity which enables criminals to impersonate and potentially defraud you. This often involves stealing credit card details but may encompass other personal information as well. It might surprise you to know that phishing is not something which has grown from the Internet all though that has given criminals a new medium to exploit.
Older versions of phishing involved such techniques as cold calling people via the telephone and claiming to be from perhaps a utility company and claiming the target had an unsettled bill - To cut a long story short the customers, full name, address, and credit card details were needed to allow the matter to be sorted out. Needless to say, once the criminal had those details they went off and had a great time at your expense.
Things of course have moved on now but the principles haven't changed that much - there are still criminals out there who want your credit card details if you are willing to give them away.
YOU CAN SHOP SAFELY
OK, does this mean shopping electronically is unsafe? - Well, the answer really depends on you, the shopper. If you have taken sensible precautions and keep your PC 'patched' with the latest security fixes (it's very easy to do) and if you use a good quality anti-virus package then online shopping is probably about as safe as shopping by telephone or taking you credit card to a high street shop and is not at all scary.
As far as most merchants (like us) are concerned, the process is really very secure - everything you type into your machine is encrypted (scrambled) before it leaves you and stays encrypted while it is being transmitted and processed all the way through to the banking authorisation system.
It is very very difficult (to all intents and purposes, nearly impossible) for criminals to break that sort of encryption in a time frame that would allow them to make use of the information. We never store credit card information so it can never be stolen from us.
VIRUSES, TROJANS AND MORE
Generally the biggest vulnerability in the whole process is your own machine and that's where we get back to Phishing. There are computer Viruses and Trojans out there which can record every keypress you make on your machine, bundle it up and next time you connect to the internet, transmit it without your knowledge to someone, perhaps even in another part of the world.
As you can imagine, if you are infected with such a virus and shop online, then potentially, all of your personal details and credit card information could be sent to someone without your knowledge. This has nothing to do with merchants (such as ourselves) who go to a lot of trouble to ensure their processes keep your data secure.
Shopping online is here to stay and so we all have to live with its benefits and shortcomings. By taking sensible precautions, you can protect yourself very effectively and will probably never experience a problem.
Our advice to you would be:
- Always keep your system patched with the latest security fixes (microsoft release them through an automated process if you use MS Windows and its all free).
- Get a good anti-virus package. There are a host of these available now and they are both cheap and easy to install and use.
- Always keep your anti-virus software updated with the latest virus signatures so it can do its job effectively (Many packages now do this automatically if you let them).
- Never open eMail attachments unless you are certain they are from a safe source (don't even trust stuff from friends and family - they might not be as vigilant as you).
- Never enter credit card or other personal details on a site which you don't trust or haven't checked out thoroughly. If you are in any doubt, telephone to see if there are real people there (if contact information is difficult to find or not there, then stay well clear). Bona Fide traders will always be happy for you to check them out - we certainly welcome it.
- Never enter personal details into a site which you arrive at through links from 'spam' email - even if it appears to be from your bank or someone credible. Staying safe generally will not cost more than £20-30 a year and this is a very small price to pay for peace of mind and your privacy.
- One last defence has been made possible with the release of Googles Maps 'Street View' (which now covers virtually every publicly accessible street in the UK). It is always good to know who you are buying from and a quick check by entering the Post Code of a vendor into 'Street View' will let you see if that online shop who claim to be the biggest and best in the world, actually operates from a small garage in a domestic dwelling - try it, its a real eye opener.
NB:
Even if you don't shop online, these are still very sensible precautions.