Social networking sites are a hunting ground for tricksters

It might be the done thing these days to say " Look me up on Facebook " when you're asked your phone number or email address. What you don't realise is that leaving all that data freely available makes you a sitting duck for social engineering attack.Social networking sites are a hunting ground for tricksters looking for the vital bit of information they can use to answer the secret question in the forgot password link of your online banking account.Not too long ago, American politician Sarah Palin's email account was hacked into using information that was already available through a simple Google search .
    
YOU KNOW THERE'S TOO MUCH INFO ONLINE IF.. :
* Your email id or phone number are online and you get spam that leads you to install a Trojan, or hundreds of unwanted messages and calls.
* You've mentioned your birth date, address, first pet's name or mother's maiden name online and the info is used to hack your email or online banking account.
*The information available about you can be used to impersonate you for illegal purposes or even to harass you or others.
*If you approve a friend request from 'Vikky Dubey' thinking it's your friend 'Vicky Dubey' , you might end up handling over access to your private data unwittingly.


PROTECT YOURSELF :
* Be extremely clear about the amount of information you would like to share online continuous validation will help you safely exist in bothy worlds.Be sensitive about divulging information about your where abouts.
* Reset all your privacy settings according to your needs. Some social networking sites share your private information with partner sites by default.
*Don't leave your data open to all.Put friends in groups and set different privacy setting for each depending on how well you know them.Re-validate friend requests and carefully evaluate those from strangers.
*Use one account for all your critical work and banking and a separate one for your interactions on social media. Set different passwords for each.


50 % of parents in india unaware about their children's online activities. Many parents don't know about parental control applications that can be used online.