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Informative Articles

Actually Working to Make Money on the Internet
There are many people out desperate for more money. Unfortunatly, most of them are desperate for a lot of money very fast. Thousands of internet sites prey on these people. In fact, these sites are around because their owners also want to get...

Ecommerce Marketing Plan
Concept of Service The current work deals with marketing offer of e-commerce service. It highlights the essential steps of marketing of a brand-new firm offering services of website construction, design, programming, development, and promotion. The...

Five Common Misconceptions to Achieving Success with your Online Business
How successful is your online business? Are you achieving the monetary rewards that you'd hoped to achieve when you set up your Web site? If not, you may have fallen prey to one of five common misconceptions to achieving success with an online...

How To Cash In on Weird Auctions on eBay
Until recently, online auction sites such as eBay have been the usual marketplace for bargain hunters and thrift shoppers looking for cheap used or surplus products. But a new breed of sellers are now coming up with very unusual auctions on eBay....

Increase Sales with Payment Solutions
Take a second and imagine your shopping on a website, find the product you've been looking for, and as you go to the order form to purchase it, you find out that the company doesn't accept payment online. Instead, you must mail a check. If you were...

 
Security Issues Everyone Should Know About Online Shopping

While there is no foolproof way to ensure that no one will EVER access information you don't want them to, there are several very effective steps that you can take to minimize the risk.

When passing sensitive data like credit card numbers, addreses, or social security numbers over the Internet, be sure that the connection you are using or implementing is encrypted using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). SSL is a commonly-used protocol for managing the security of message transmissions over the Internet. Essentially, SSL works by using a public key, or password, to encrypt data that's transferred over the connection. The receiving software, usually a browser such as Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape Navigator, decrypts the message into meaningful information for the intended recipient. The encryption of the data prevents unauthorized access while the data is being transmitted over the network. (By convention, URL's that require a SSL connection start with https instead of http.)

Another step that can be taken to minimize the risk involved with transmitting information across the Internet is to use several different e-mail


accounts, each with a specific purpose. To limit your exposure to unwanted spam and potentially dangerous viruses, the e-mail address provided by your ISP or Web host should only be given to trusted parties, such as family members, friends, co-workers, and business associates. If you frequently fill out online forms that require the use of an e-mail address, use a "throw-away" address, such as one that can be obtained from Yahoo! or Hotmail. This will help stop your primary e-mail account from being flooded with unwanted mail, and it might reduce your exposure to viruses as well.

Several other key preventative measures to safeguard your personal information include checking your credit reports regularly, paying by credit card for online transactions (instead of ACH bank account debits), and searching for your name at a good search engine, like Google, to find out what information about you is online.

About the Author

Alan is the lead developer for InfoServe Media, LLC (http://www.infoservemedia.com/), a Web development company that specializes in Web site design, hosting, domain name registration, and promotion for small businesses.