I just spent quite a bit of time reorganizing my Password list, weeding out and unsubscribing to organizations that I no longer am interested in hearing from. What a time consuming task. I took the list down by 21 passwords, making my grand total of PWs 113. Oy! I also cut out some email addresses that I no longer use, which was a royal pain. I did this to make my life less cluttered, but also because I don’t want my name out there making it an easy target for hackers.
If you don’t need an email, get rid of it. Don’t ignore it. Same goes for credit card, travel programs, job hunting sites, or bank accounts that you’ve cancelled. Make sure everything has been deleted by the source.
One of our services at MMC is “reputation management.” Protecting your online identity falls under this category. This topic is vast and will be addressed here from time to time.
Hackers, if they are so inclined, can get into an old email account, read your correspondence and begin the process of stealing information for their benefit. That’s why you should delete any dormant emails or accounts floating in cyberspace.
For most businesses, registering with Google Alerts is a smart first step in protecting your name and brand. It’s easy. Here, Google Alerts will send you an email whenever they catch your name or brand being mentioned online. This way you can monitor what people are saying about you. Aside from Google Alerts there are several other monitoring tools … which I’ll discuss next time.