Tips for Safe Online Shopping

One tactic favored by malicious hackers is to set up their own fake shopping websites. Fake websites can either infect you the moment you arrive on them by way of drive-by-downloads, or malicious links. However, the most dangerous aspect you should be concerned about is the checkout process.

Completing a checkout process will give cybercriminals your most important information: credit card data (including security number), name and address. This opens you up to identity theft, credit card fraud or social engineering attacks.

Access secure shopping sites that protect your information

If you want to purchase from a website, make sure it has SSL (secure sockets layer) encryption installed.

To know this, the site should start with https:// and you should notice the lock symbol, which is in the address bar at the top.

• Strange URL’s such as “prada-at-awesome-price.com” or “the-bestonlineshopping.com”.
• A strange selection of brands. For instance, the website claims to be specialized in clothes but also sells car parts or construction materials.
• Broken language. Any self-respecting online shop will hire a specialized copywriter to come up with beautiful product descriptions. Alarm bells should go off in your head if descriptions don’t make sense.
• Strange contact information. If the email for customer service is “ebaysupport@gmail.com” instead of “support@ebay.com” then you can bet that online shop is fake.
• Prices are ridiculously low. An online shop that has an iPhone 7 at 150$ is most likely trying to scam you.
• Horrible design. Online shops, particularly those in the fashion niche, take great of the design and usability of their websites.

Hopefully, these basic tips will help you purchase products only safe online shopping sites.

Some people think Wi-Fi is a more important resource than water or food. We admit their arguments are fairly convincing (a Wi-Fi connection allows you to buy as much food/water as you need).

However, Wi-Fi however has some serious limitations in terms of security. Unsecured connections allow a hacker to intercept ALL of your traffic and see everything you’re doing on an online shop in real time. This means checkout information, passwords, emails, addresses, you name it.

Unpatched software is a frequent cause of malware infections. Online shoppers are most at risk because of this, due to the sensitive information involved.

Make sure you at least have an updated browser when you order things online. This will help secure your cookies and cache, while preventing a data leakage.

You’ll probably balk at having to constantly update your software. It’s a tedious and time consuming operation, and most of the time the benefits are under the hood and offer no new features.

For this reason, we’ve developed Heimdal FREE, a tool that automatically updates your software, all while being invisible and not bothering you with needless notifications.

Bulletproof your system against cybercriminals

There are more tools out there to help you do safe online shopping.

An antivirus has one major disadvantage: it is a reactive solution to a malware infection. This means that most of the times it becomes effective AFTER a malware has arrived on your PC.

As a solution to all this, we propose you use a tool that can block an incoming malware BEFORE it reaches your PC.

Such software should be able to do the following:

• Using an advanced traffic scanner, it can filter incoming and outgoing traffic to your PC and detect any potential malware.
• Even if malware has somehow made its way onto your PC, it can effectively remove it from your device
•  It will scan a website for embedded malware and block it from loading in case it finds one.

We really believe that our own Heimdal PRO is worth your time and trust, so maybe you’d like to give it a try.

Here just a few relevant online shopping safety tips:

• Don’t click on any suspicious links or emails;
• Report any site that seems fraudulent, and also use the “flag as spam” button for any suspicious email;
• Don’t reveal more personal information than you have to in order to complete the purchase.