Quick Links
With the prevalence of identity theft and harassment on social media, it’s more important than ever to prioritize safeguarding our privacy. Being mindful of how we navigate online is key to avoiding data exploitation. If you want to maintain a private online presence and steer clear of data breaches, avoid these common mistakes on social media.
1Giving Apps Access to Your Social Media Accounts
First, you should avoid using third-party apps or extensions to improve your social media experience or unlock premium features not available in the free version. These apps often request access to your account, and if you check their terms and conditions, you’ll find they may gain permission to view your photos, chats, profile details, and more.
Likewise, the option to use a social login for other apps has become widespread. While it might seem harmless to sign in to a game or another app using your social media credentials, it grants those apps access not only to your account information but also potentially to the login details you used.
Therefore, you should avoid sharing this sensitive data with third-party apps and refrain fromusing your social media account for social sign-ins.
2Leaving Your Profile Public
When your social media profile is public, it’s visible to everyone. Anyone can see your photos, personal details, and everything you post on your feed or timeline. Scammers can exploit this publicly available information. They can create fake profiles using your identity and impersonate you.
This not only harms your reputation but also puts your friends and family at risk. Impersonators may use your identity to ask for money or try to obtain private information from your contacts. To prevent these risks, you should lock your social media profiles, limiting access to only your added friends.
Most social media platforms offer this privacy feature. If your profile is currently public, it’s a good idea to change it to private.
3Divulging Too Much Personal Information
Even if you set your profile to private, you should be cautious about sharing personal information. Avoid sharing your date of birth, phone number, or home address, as these details can easily be exploited for identity theft. Also, refrain from taking selfies with sensitive documents such as your ID, passport, or credit/debit card.
Also, don’t overshare about your health, relationships, or financial status. Likewise, don’t discuss matters related to your workplace to avoid compromising your company’s privacy.
4Neglecting Your Privacy Settings
Neglecting basic security measures can also leave your account and privacy vulnerable. This includes using a weak, easily guessable password or using the same password across multiple social media platforms. Likewise, failing toenable two-factor authenticationmakes it simpler for hackers to hack into your account and compromise your privacy.
To mitigate these risks, you should always use a strong, difficult-to-guess password and use a unique password for each of your social media accounts. Also, avoid storing the login credentials online. If you haven’t already enabled two-factor authentication, set it up to bolster the security of your account.
You should also go over your privacy settings on your social media profiles to check that you aren’t sharing data that you don’t want to.
5Sharing Your Travel Plans
Travel plans are one of thoseimportant things you shouldn’t share on social media. If you announce your vacation plans, it could alert burglars monitoring your activity that your home is empty, increasing the risk of theft. Similarly, real-time check-ins during your trip provide fraudsters with information about your whereabouts, which they can exploit.
To protect your privacy, avoid posting your travel plans on social media, refrain from doing check-ins, andremove the location details from your photosto prevent giving away your location.
If you’re a solo-traveling influencer, and you have to engage with your audience during your trip, develop a habit of doing check-ins from your previous location once you’ve moved on to a new one.
6Engaging With Unknown People
We all have some people on our friend lists who are only social media acquaintances. We might have connected with them through a public group or post, even though we’ve never met them in real life or had any video communication. Despite being strangers, they have a place on our friends list.
Even if you’ve taken steps to make your account more private, these unknown people can still pose a serious privacy risk, as you never really know who they are. They might have connected with you just to monitor your activities and exploit the information later. If you have unknown people on your list, consider unfriending them.
If that feels too drastic and you want to stay connected, at least adjust your privacy settings to limit what they can see about your activities. Also,avoid adding strangersfrom now on.
7Using Your Social Media Accounts in Public or on a Public Computer
Lastly, using your social media account on a public computer can also jeopardize your privacy. Fraudsters can install keyloggers on these devices to capture your login credentials, hackers can intercept your data, and if you forget to log out when leaving the device, anyone could access your account later on.
Using your social media account while commuting or in other public places can allow shoulder surfers tolook over your shoulder and see your private information. If they manage to see your login credentials, that’s even worse. To avoid this risk, refrain from using social media on public computers or in public spaces.
Similarly, you should avoid connecting your phone or computer to public Wi-Fi networks, as these networks are often insecure, and hackers can intercept the information shared over them. When you’re in public, it’s safer to use your phone’s data instead of connecting to random free networks.
These are some of the mistakes you should avoid to safeguard your privacy while using social media platforms. Make it a habit to regularly check the devices that are logged into your account. If you spot an unfamiliar device, it could be a sign that your account has been compromised.
Taking swift action to remove the unknown device can help protect your account and privacy in a timely manner.
