How do you know who the reputable firms are and who the flakes are? How do you know if your personal information is safe being transmitted over the Internet to the site that you might be shopping at? These are questions that you need to ask yourself when you make the decision to make those online purchases.

The first item on the checklist will be the browser that you use to get around on the Internet. Your browser should comply with industry security standards, such as Secure Sockets Layer or SSL. These standards were created to scramble the information that you send over the Internet helping to secure the transaction. Hackers have software that can intercept the packets of information as it travels from you to the online store. They can then acquire information that would help them to gain access to account numbers, passwords and other personal information that must be given to these stores in order to make purchases. Most of the reputable sites will have a security certificate that is routed through one of the larger firms. You can check for the lock symbol that shows up in the lower right hand corner of Internet Explorer when a secure site is entered. What you need to be wary of is a security warning that you have to install the certificate instead of the browser doing it automatically. This installation window should be a red flag that something might not be right. You can click on a button to view where the certificate came from and to what site it belongs.

If you use Window, which most of the world does, then you are probably using Internet Explorer. This is where the Windows Update site comes into play. You will be the most secure if you have upgraded to version 6 of the browser and installed all of the critical updates that are available. The newer versions of Windows allow you to set your system up to download and install all critical updates as they come available. This would be the best option that is available. I will still go to the Windows Update site periodically to be sure that the updates are all done.

Try to know who you are dealing with. The big boys are a pretty safe bet but after that you will need to do some research to be sure of who the stores are. Software is available to set up a shopping cart on pretty much any site on the Web. It would help to ease your mind if you are able to call the company before your first purchase and talk to a real person. If there is no way to communicate with the company, even by e-mail, I would be looking for somewhere else to shop.

The next item would be to pay with a credit card. This allows you some recourse if something goes wrong. The Fair Credit Billing Act will protect these transactions. This gives you the right to dispute charges under certain circumstances and possibly withhold payment while your credit card company investigates your charges. If you happen to shop on a site that does not have a valid SSL certificate and your credit card information is stolen and used somewhere else you generally would only be liable for the first $50 of any unauthorized charges.

And finally, use a decent password. Do not use “qwerty” or your address or you phone number or any part of your name. Some of the passwords that I have seen could be guessed by a three year old. Use a combination of letters, numbers and symbols. You do not want any words that could be found in any dictionary since there are programs to try all the combinations automatically. Most of the good sites won’t allow this type of brute force cracking but if you get on the wrong site then you might be vulnerable if your password is to easy to guess.

And finally, save a copy of your invoice. Most of the online shop will send a confirmation to the e-mail address that you used to register. Forward that to your main e-mail and keep a copy of it until you have received your merchandise and are sure that you are happy with your purchase.

It is actually very easy to be same when shopping online. You need to pay attention to what you are doing and read before you click. If you take to time to follow your intuition you will find out that if it does not feel right, you need to look into why you feel that way.  If it does not feel right then investigate. Ask questions and learn to learn.