Tiscali: Search your Digital Fingerprint

Viruses, worms, spyware, and other nasty stuff can infect your PC, and lead to the loss of your personal information. Yet, many of us willingly upload personal information to the internet. This information, our digital fingerprint, can be found and used by anyone.

A lot of people forget that a moment of madness when they are young can really rebound against you when you become a person of consequence later on in your life
Lord Erroll, All Party Internet Group, House of Lords

Just because you uploaded a piece of information about yourself does not mean that you can control it. One piece of stray online information can give away a lot of information about you. Take the Darwin case as an example.

A photo of John Darwin turned up on a Panamanian website, dated 2006 and resulted in Anne Darwin admitting that she had known her husband John had not died in 2002.

• The amount of storage available to us is growing at an incredible rate


• We are all being encouraged to put little bits of our lives online


• As intrinsically sociable creatures, we human beings like to share information


• Every time we register for a new web application on Facebook or upload our photos and videos to a website, we are enlarging our own digital fingerprint


• Every time we mention someone else, we are enlarging theirs

Most personal information stored online is public by default. Unless you change your privacy settings, your social network page will show up in a simple web search. Your date of birth, address and mother's maiden name are common banking security questions. If someone can collect enough information about you, they can pose as you.

• A lost identity can be used by criminals to obtain a bank loan, a bank account, new credit card even buy a house


• Personal information is being traded in an increasingly sophisticated criminal marketplace

• Identity Theft is costing the UK economy over £1.7bn annually Source: CIFAS
• Typical incidents involve the theft of up to £10,000 Source: YouGov
• Up to 150 million PCs on the internet are under the control of hackers Source: Lavasoft
• 1 in 10 people in the UK - that is 6 million people - have been a victim of Identity Fraud Source: Which
• ID Fraud is the fasting growing crime in the UK Source: CIFAS

Tiscali SpyGuard protection complements your traditional anti-virus, internet security or secure backup software to provide you with real-time online ID theft protection.

Wiping your digital fingerprint off the web completely is an expensive measure. It is easier to be careful of what you post in the first place. Remember, universities and prospective employers have been known to check out the profile pages of applicants.

Find yourself with Tiscali Search: What will you find?

Sanjit Chudha