Almost everyone can shop online. Okay, now let’s make sure it’s as safe as possible for you.
When shopping online, you risk non-delivery of goods, misuse of your payment card, late delivery or exchange of goods. There are more risks to the way you buy. It is not possible to say that online shopping is the Wild West, and it is just a different approach.
Suspicious E-Shop
There are several signs to recognize him. One of them is limited payment options. If you only accept payments in cryptocurrencies, you need to be careful. This is not the rule, and also, the receipt via PayPal is not a sign that it is a scam. But if he wants to make money, he needs your money, and it should give you a way to carry out the transaction.
It does not have to be directly connected to the payment gateway. Payment by bank transfer is enough. Smaller e-shops use this form, and that’s fine. This cannot be considered a risk, and it’s more of an obstacle for you to have your order executed as soon as possible. It is waiting to be paid. Today, however, it is no exception to having multiple bank accounts, and merchants will give you a choice to make the transfer as fast as possible.
Nor can the new business be considered suspicious. Everyone has started, and it would be a mistake to think that a new e-shop is a risk. Ask yourself the following question: “When will it stop being new?” After a year? Two or more? So just because you haven’t heard of a business doesn’t mean it’s a scam.
Safe Browser
This is an essential prerequisite for all your purchases and protecting your information. There is no point in parsing something like an updated browser, and they update automatically without you noticing.
But you can improve your protection by using a more secure browser. Antivirus programs have such built-in protection and, along with their installation, get used to create a link to this browser on the desktop. We recommend using it if you want to protect yourself even more. Its advantage is that it has locked out expansion options and other restrictions. This eliminates the additional risk that you usually bring to your browser by mistake, thus smuggling fake add-ons into it or minimally problematic from the point of view of privacy.
These programs work by the antivirus system transferring your internet banking to them. As soon as you enter addresses in the bank or click on a bookmark, the temporary page inserted there by the antivirus program will ask you to use its installed secure browser.
Emails
The shopping opportunity comes through emails, and it is pretty standard—promotions, trailers, new product announcements, pre-orders, etc. Emails are one way to bring you to an e-shop. As you know, you receive emails from the e-shops you visit in your inbox. Be careful when an offer from a Chinese store appears in the mailbox. You can order various goods, whether electronics or cosmetics or, for example, clothing. Our experience shows that stores present information mostly correctly. It is up to you whether you notice the differences.
For example, a charger for Apple devices that is significantly cheaper may not be directly from Apple, and this may be a feature listed as “iPhone compatible”, etc. The charger may be fine, but do you want to risk it? Is it worth taking the risk of a short circuit or another internal failure of the charger due to its insufficient processing for a few euros saved?
Also, keep in mind that you leave your data in an unknown store. How will it be with the guarantee? To which province in China will you send it as part of the complaint, and how long will it take? It is practically possible to say that you have no chance in this process.
In connection with the description of the goods, you need to pay attention to what is being sold. The most prominent object does not necessarily have to be this suitable type, and it doesn’t have to be a cable, but decoration for a handbag. It will be mentioned, and you may overlook it and say that you will buy this product.
Sales
Black Friday, Cyber Monday, St. Patrick, Christmas, Easter, spring discounts on Steam, autumn, winter, summer, you could continue even more. Gone are when it was necessary to catch goods at a deal because then it was not long or it was no longer possible to buy it so quickly. Today you still have some discounts, and the whole business model is based on crossed-out prices. There is no hurry, and you will rarely miss anything.
So how do you find out if it’s a discount or if the store inflated the price a few days ago and reduced the price on Black Friday?
Reviews
Shops are obsessed with double Chinese reviews. Evaluating the store accordingly is not objective. As mentioned above, new stores don’t have many. So simple, and it must be taken into account that not everyone wants to evaluate. Many of us want to buy, support the store and not tie each other with another email that will spam us with a request for comments and stars.
The assessment of the store’s quality according to the reviews must be taken from a neutral point of view, as well as the evaluation of the store. Some have to wait two days for the goods too. Some may have misread what they are ordering and criticized the goods. It’s hard to say, it will be a particular indicator, but stars are not everything. The opposite is also true. Someone might like it, and you didn’t like their pizza very much. And you relied on the review. This is a slightly different type of business than we cover in the article, but it is one of the typical examples.
Also Read: WhatsApp Business – Advantages, Strategies, and Uses
Separate The Cards
Some banks today support the creation of the virtual card. It is suitable for paying over the internet. Maybe in places you don’t quite believe yet. You create such a card, transfer money to it in a few seconds and use it to pay. Even if you are the victim of a malicious code attack or fraud, you will not lose all your money.
This is one of the best ways. For example, if you don’t have a virtual card, feel free to set aside a credit card to pay online. Once you have to pay at a store, it does not have encryption support from you to the server. One solution is to use a VPN connection.