Digital Privacy & Online Scams
Government-sourced guides on protecting your identity online, recognizing phishing and scam emails, securing your accounts, and reporting digital fraud.
23 articles
Is It Safe to Save Your Card Details on a Website?
When you save a card on a website, the retailer does not typically store your actual card number. Instead, they use a process called tokenization. A unique token is generated and stored, which represents your card for future transactions. Your actual card number is stored with the payment processor, not the retailer.
Is This Website Legit? How to Check Before You Buy
When shopping online, consumers regularly encounter websites they have never purchased from before. Knowing how to verify a site takes two to three minutes and requires no technical expertise.
Facebook Marketplace: A Safety Guide for Buyers
Facebook Marketplace connects buyers and sellers in the same geographic area for local transactions and also supports shipping for some listings. Most sellers are private individuals, not registered businesses.
How Scammers Use Social Media to Target Victims
Social media platforms have become the primary hunting ground for many categories of fraud because they provide scammers with targeting data, built-in trust (through friend networks and brand recognition), and direct access to potential victims at scale.
How to Secure Your Smartphone From Hackers
Your smartphone holds more sensitive information than most computers: banking apps, email, contacts, photos, location history, and saved passwords. Securing it is less about defeating sophisticated hackers and more about closing the most common entry points they actually use.
How to File a Complaint Against a Fake Website
Reporting a fake website accomplishes more than most people realise. Google Safe Browsing and Microsoft SmartScreen warnings appear in browsers for hundreds of millions of users, reports from consumers feed those warning systems. Domain registrars can suspend fraudulent domains. And FTC complaint data drives enforcement investigations.
Privacy Settings You Should Check Right Now
Default settings on most platforms and devices are configured for maximum data collection and sharing, not maximum user privacy. Changing a handful of settings across your phone, browser, and social media accounts significantly reduces your data exposure. This guide covers the most important ones.
Understanding Your Rights Under the Privacy Act
The Privacy Act is specifically a federal government accountability law, not a broad consumer privacy law. It gives citizens rights over their information held by federal agencies, the IRS, SSA, VA, federal law enforcement, and others. Understanding what it covers, and what it does not, helps you know when and how to use it.
How to Use a Password Manager Safely
Most people reuse passwords because memorising dozens of unique ones is impractical. Password managers solve this problem by doing the memorisation for you. They are one of the most effective security improvements available, and free options exist.
The Most Common Online Scams and How to Avoid Them
Online scams evolve constantly, but the most prevalent ones follow consistent patterns year after year. Understanding what the top categories are, and how each one works, gives you a reliable mental checklist before responding to any suspicious contact.
Can You Really Get Hacked From a Text Message?
This is one of the most commonly misunderstood security questions. The short answer is: receiving a text does not hack your phone. What matters is what you do with it.
How to Tell If a Website Is Safe to Buy From
Online shopping fraud is one of the FTC's most consistently reported fraud categories. Fake online stores have become increasingly sophisticated, they use professional templates, display security badges, and in some cases accept payment and simply never ship anything.
What Is the Dark Web and Should You Be Worried?
The dark web generates significant anxiety partly because of how it is portrayed. The reality for most consumers is more mundane: it is a place where stolen data ends up after breaches, and the practical response to finding your information there is straightforward.
Protecting Your Children's Privacy Online
Children face distinct online privacy risks: aggressive data collection by apps and games, exposure to inappropriate contacts, and identity theft that may not be discovered until they try to open a bank account as an adult. Each of these requires a different type of protection.
What Is a Data Breach and What Should You Do If You're Affected?
Data breaches happen constantly. Major companies, healthcare providers, and government agencies have all experienced them. Most people will be affected by at least one breach during their lifetime, often without knowing it for months. What you do in the days after learning your data was exposed can significantly limit the damage.
How to Recognize and Avoid Online Job Scams
Job scams have grown significantly alongside remote work. Scammers post on Indeed, LinkedIn, ZipRecruiter, and other legitimate platforms alongside real listings, and they have become skilled at mimicking the look and feel of genuine employers. Knowing the mechanics of these scams is the most reliable protection.
Understanding Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) and Why It Matters
Passwords alone are no longer sufficient protection. They get leaked in data breaches, guessed by automated tools, or stolen through phishing. Two-factor authentication adds a second layer that stops the vast majority of account takeover attempts even when a password has been compromised.
How to Stop Robocalls and Phone Scams
Robocalls are the most complained-about consumer issue the FTC receives. The Do Not Call Registry helps with legitimate telemarketers, but illegal robocallers ignore it entirely. Stopping unwanted calls requires a combination of registration, carrier tools, and third-party blocking apps. This guide covers all three.
What to Do If Someone Is Using Your Identity Online
Identity theft moves fast. The sooner you act, the less damage gets done. Whether someone has opened accounts in your name, filed taxes using your Social Security number, or taken over your online accounts, each type requires different steps. This guide walks through all of them.
Protecting Your Personal Info on Public Wi-Fi
Public Wi-Fi at coffee shops, hotels, airports, and libraries is convenient but carries real risks. Anyone on the same network can potentially intercept unencrypted data traveling between your device and the internet. This does not mean you should avoid public Wi-Fi entirely, but it does mean certain activities should wait until you are on a secure connection.
How to Report Online Scams in the U.S.
Reporting a scam will not always get your money back, but it matters more than most people realise. Federal agencies use complaint data to identify patterns, build cases, and coordinate enforcement that stops scammers from harming more people. Some FTC enforcement actions have resulted in refund programs for affected consumers. Your report is part of that process.
What To Do If You Clicked a Suspicious Link
It happens to careful people all the time. A text that looks like a shipping notification. An email that appears to be from your bank. A social media message from a friend whose account was already compromised. One click before you notice something feels off.
How to Recognize a Phishing Email or Text
Phishing attacks are the most common form of online fraud in the United States. They work because they look like messages from real companies: your bank, Amazon, the IRS, a shipping carrier. Recognizing the warning signs before you click or respond is the most effective protection available.