Net shopping's blue Christmas

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theft scams," said Prat Moghe, chief executive at Tizor Systems, a security applications vendor. "Phishers know that there will be a lot of credit card activity and that shoppers are less likely to be careful."

Other threats, such as the recent Christmas-themed Zafi computer virus, have also set their sights on consumers and their financial information.

Fending off the cold reality
The best thing consumers can do to protect themselves online is to apply the common sense they use when shopping offline, experts said. Nearly every industry watcher questioned regarding the holiday threat espoused the classic mantras of "buyer beware," and "if a deal seems too good to be true, it probably is."

Security professionals also encourage people to do as much research online about any company they may deal with, and to try to make sure that even reviews of an e-tailers' legitimacy are themselves valid. Moreover, shoppers should look to their own PCs to make sure that malicious software capable of spying on their transactions does not hitch a ride.

"There are two sets of things that need to be done," said Howard Schmidt, a former U.S. cybersecurity czar in the Bush administration and now chief security officer at eBay. "Secure your computer by keeping your antivirus up to date, keep your patches up to date, and the other piece is go to known sites, trusted sites."

Alert
Phishing lures

Check out this list of recent scams and tips on spotting bogus e-mails.

Spire's Lindstrom also stressed the importance of dealing with an online store that you know.

"You simply must have a way to validate e-commerce sites that you're working with, and you should always work to establish a sense of the legitimacy of the companies that you're doing business with," Lindstrom said. Another good move is to use sites that advertise security validation from vendors such as VeriSign, Thawte and Authorize.net, he said.

However, Lindstrom pointed out that some fraudsters have gone to great lengths to imitate the endorsement of such security services, even creating hard-to-spot imitations of a security company's validation icons. For that reason, Lindstrom said, it is crucial to click through any e-commerce site promising such protection to make sure that any security endorsements are the real thing.

Merchants should be concerned about mimicked sites too, as the problem could make potential future customers more hesitant to shop online.

"The industry needs to educate those consumers--the new guys--as they come online, so that they don't have a negative experience and we don't lose them back to the brick-and-mortar world," said Mark Griffiths, vice president of authentication services at VeriSign, which processes online credit card transactions.

Consumers have to be convinced to stop and think before they give away their credit card numbers or transfer funds to e-commerce vendor, he added.

In the end, the key to avoiding holiday fraud is keeping a level head, said Jonathan Penn, an analyst with Forrester Research.

"The deal is: If you wouldn't normally buy from somebody, this is the worst time of the year to take chances," Penn said. "Don't be stupid--it's that simple."

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