Tip 6 in an occasional series. Keep visiting regularly for more Online Shopping Safety Tips.

Reading an e-commerce site’s privacy policy (and if they haven’t got one this should start alarm bells ringing) to see what they will do with your information is a vital step in ensuring a happy and safe online shopping trip. Some companies use your address for their own nefarious marketing purposes; more sell your information to third parties. You may have no legal control over who these details are passed to – spammers, identity thieves, anyone – and a quick check of the privacy policy may throw up some interesting results.

While the privacy policy can easily be faked if a site was so inclined, it is likely that other indicators would point to dodgy dealings (and you should be well enough educated by now to know to steer well clear). The purpose of this tip is to prevent above-aboard companies getting your personal details and selling them on. Spam is the most common result of such sales, but with identity theft on the rise the consequences could quickly become more serious.

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