Have you searched yourself online lately? Your identity could be at risk
It’s one of the taboos of our time, but plenty of us are guilty of it. In fact, 41 percent of Americans are brave enough to admit they plug their own names into search engines frequently. But did you ever wonder who else is studying your online footprint? Here’s a hint: it’s not just old flames and curious colleagues. Identity thieves have their eyes on your digital presence, too — and identity theft has been on the rise since the beginning of the pandemic.
Online criminals have a plethora of weapons in their arsenal, from phishing emails to password hacking. But first they have to know you exist — and the more they know about you, the easier it is to bait you. It doesn’t take something as dramatic as a security breach at a major company to dig up the dirt on you, though. Scammers usually start with the plain old internet; it’s the path of least resistance.
A quick search of your name alone generates links to dozens of what cybersecurity experts call “people search engines,” kind of like the internet versions of telephone books. Plenty of these sites don’t even require a membership to access things like your home address, email address, phone number, birth date, and relatives. The information isn’t always 100 percent accurate, but scammers can find more than enough leads.
Your social media accounts are bound to be top search results, too, offering all sorts of personal information: your workplace, hobbies and even your pet’s name, an all-too-common security question. And popular real estate sites wouldn’t be far behind, sometimes divulging the details of your property ownership in painstaking detail.
https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/digital-footprint-online-identity-theft-malwarebytes-yahoo-subscriptions-212614314.html
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