5 Ways to Secure Yourself Online and Regain Your Privacy

User privacy has again become a hot topic in the media. Social media site visitors are told their information is safe, in fact, there are leaks or breaches of privacy where sensitive information is available to third parties.

On top of this, the longer we spend online, the more ISP’s get to know of our surfing habits. Users are also faced with online threats from Malware and hackers.

To top all of this, governments wish to monitor the internet in their fight against terror. For a public service which was supposed to be free for all, is becoming more intrusive into a user’s private lives than ever before.

Here are 5 ways which you can help secure your privacy and protect yourself while online.

Secure Browsers

Most up-to-date versions of popular web-browsers offer incognito mode or private browsing. Although this doesn’t mask who or where you are while on the internet, they do delete your history.

If you have done any online banking or made any purchases information is held on your device. With this incognito mode, you can either automatically delete this history, or the browser will ask to remove this information.

All cookies and history are not kept so if anyone does access your system, no sensitive data can be found.

Tracking Web Sites and Ad- Blocking

What might appear to be merely pop-up ads can be more malicious for the unwary user. Tracking websites can be included as they are all designed to catch hold of user data. In its purest form, it is designed with the intention of selling your information for marketing purposes. The above browsers can have extensions added to them which can prevent this intrusion.

Disconnect can block most tracking sites from following you around the web, and uBlock Origin which is one of the most popular ad-blockers Can prevent the continual pop-ups from appearing.

VPN’s and Public Hotspots

Wi-Fi zones are convenient. However, they leave anyone’s connection wide open for intrusion by hackers. As these have no restrictions, anyone is free to use them, so they are taken advantage of. Even with the above precautions on your device, you will be vulnerable. The best way to protect yourself against this and also your home connection is using one of the top VPN providers.

Once you use a VPN service a high percentage of threats are eliminated, and they also stop your ISP or a governments prying eyes from seeing what you are doing while online.

Manage Your Passwords

Social media, online banking or any other area where you need to log in will require a password. The majority of users use the same one or a variant of one. This is done for ease of remembering, although it is a weak point in your online security.

The best option is to choose a password for each account which is very difficult to remember and then make use of a top-rated password manager. With these, you don’t need to remember all your passwords as the software takes care of that and also protects them from anyone finding them on your device.

Malware

This is one of the largest threats users are faced with. Malware can install keyloggers, spyware, and ransomware which will lock your system until you have paid for an unlocking key.

Viruses have expanded from days of old and are now much more of a threat as they no longer aim to damage your system. Information is gathered and relayed back to hackers who would now have access to all of your accounts.

One such company that provides an excellent solution is Bitdefender. Although it uses Antivirus in its name, it goes far beyond this and checks for any suspicious activity on your system.

Conclusion

All of the above can help secure your system and protect your privacy. Most threats are unseen, and users are oblivious to something which is running in the background and harvesting what they are doing and what they are viewing while browsing.

Although there are many free options users can choose, there are some areas where this can lead to further threats. Major antivirus providers are reputable and have been around for a good many years. The browser add-ons are rated by users and Android Play-Store or the Apple store, if these were not ideal, it would be highlighted.

One area where paying a little extra to get the best is when using a leading VPN service. If you have a family and wish to protect all of your connections.

A few minutes browsing and you will find a VPN service which stands above all the others. A few dollars per month is a small price to pay when family or banking accounts are involved.

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