The busiest e-commerce week thus far happened in November 2020. Digital consumers around the world spent an overwhelming 2.3 billion hours on online shopping in just one week! Wouldn’t it be nice if this quantity went together with the shopping experience quality and safety?
In this post, we’ll walk through the risks of e-commerce. We’ll guide you through the 10 most common online shopping mistakes that could cost you a lot of money and time. After a few minutes of reading, you’ll get to know how to upgrade your safety and become an aware online buyer.
Ready? Let’s go shopping!
Online shopping mistakes concerning your Data Protection
1. Using public WiFi
Where do you keep your most precious belongings? Obviously not in a place where everyone has easy access, right?
It’s the same with the data you enter while using public Wi-Fi. You should avoid public connections at all costs unless you wish to have your credit card information stolen, sometimes without even knowing it.
2. Using a debit card instead of a credit card
Remember the advice your mom used to give you before every school trip: “Do not keep all your money in one place in case it gets stolen !”
Credit cards or prepaid gift cards are a modern version of this life-saving tip. It’s best to have a dedicated credit card just for your online purchases. In case of any cyberattack, you won’t lose all your life savings.
Additionally, a credit card is much safer than a debit card. If your card is used by an unauthorized person, it usually affects your card issuer more than you.
3. Not using a strong password or using the same one everywhere
As you probably know, it’s impossible to remember all the important dates, numbers, PIN codes, and on top of that, all the passwords you use online. That’s why we often get tempted to come up with just one password and set it for all our online accounts, and that’s a huge mistake! Luckily, safe password managers were invented to take the burden off your shoulders.
Remember: the stronger your password, the more protected your data will be.
Online shopping mistakes concerning Retailer Reliability
4. Ordering from insecure or unknown sites
You should always make sure you purchase from a trusted retailer, yet sometimes it's impossible to tell the difference between a legitimate website and a copycat scam site.
This is why it is highly advisable to type the URLs directly into the address bar before you start shopping. But let's face it: nobody has time for that! The faster the shopping process - the better.
The least you can do is always verify the URL address before providing any checkout information. It will cost you just a few seconds to check if the address starts with https (s = secure), meaning your data is encrypted and stays confidential between your computer and the site.
5. Not reading the reviews
Do not underestimate the importance of online reviews.
Most reliable retailers will do everything to keep their customers satisfied by keeping a close eye on all the less favorable reviews. By browsing the reviews you can get to know a lot about the product quality, general user experience, the store itself, and its customer policy.
If you're skeptical about the 'perfect' reviews, take a look at the 3-star ones - they will usually contain both pros and cons. Bonus tip: check the reviews with photos attached - it's a great way to see the product before you order it.
Safe online shopping takes time, but the good news is, once you become aware of all the things that may go wrong when purchasing online you’ll become an e-commerce safety guru in no time!
Feel free to share our tips with your loved ones. Together we can make the Internet a safer place.
Altroo Team
P.S. Want to know more? Download our free ebook about common shopping mistakes or join our community on facebook.
