Security and shredding tips for home workers

How home workers can safeguard their identity

Don’t get caught out by fraud – today’s guest post by Russell Richardson explains the steps home workers can take to protect their data and paperwork.

Criminals have become increasingly more sophisticated regarding how they gather information. Consequently, the need for home workers to be vigilant when it comes to safeguarding that information, especially personal data, has become more acute.



Whenever any paperwork includes personal information it should be thoroughly destroyed before being thrown out. Failure to do so may prove costly if it ends up in the wrong hands. The type of personal information that particularly needs to be protected are bank details and passwords. Throwing out a PIN number, for instance, could prove to be catastrophic if found by an unscrupulous individual, and the same is true if personal passwords are not safeguarded. 



Bank accounts would be obvious targets if personal information fell into the wrong hands, but there could be other problems, too. Working from home and needing to access websites could prove to be problematic if your personal information has been stolen. It’s always wise to check your account details on a regular basis to make sure everything appears as it should be.

One trick a hacker may attempt is to just change your email address to theirs if you are paid through PayPal. It’s just one small change, and one that could be easily missed, but it can be the difference between working all week for the benefit of a hacker or actually getting paid. 



In the case of a personal website a password could be hacked and used by the hacker as somewhere to promote their products. Spyware and malware also need to be blocked, and are two types of software that search for information about the computer user. There is free anti-spyware and anti-malware software available and they, or more extensive paid for programs, should be utilized to give peace of mind. 



Destroying unwanted personal paperwork is something that is hardly time-consuming, so there’s no real excuse for home workers not being able to spend a few minutes making sure that your information can never be used by anyone. Paper shredding is a more effective way of destroying data than by hand, and fire more effective still. Although, in both cases you should check the destroyed data to make sure that no usable information is still visible. 



The security of one’s personal information is something that should never be taken for granted. Just because you’ve never had a bad experience doesn’t excuse complacency. Complacency is something that the unscrupulous will happily take advantage of.