5 Ways to Protect Your Personal Information on Public Computers
Sometimes you don't have a choice—you're away from your desk or laptop and you have to use a computer in a library, hotel, Internet cafe, or other public location. It can present some real challenges to your privacy, because the host may not have all the security software you have installed on your own computer. However, you have a better shot at keeping your private information private with a few precautions.
1. Keep a flash drive on hand. That way if you have to download anything (such as e-mail attachments) you can save it to your personal drive rather than the desktop, and you won't have to worry about deleting items from the desktop when you log off.
2. Pay attention to prompts in the Web browser asking if it should remember passwords. A surprising number of times even public computers are set to default to remembering passwords. Make sure those boxes aren't checked before you log into your email or other password-protected accounts.
3. Clear your cache, browsing history, passwords, and temp files before logging off.
4. If you can at all avoid it, do not bank online from a public computer. It just isn't worth the risk.
5. If you must bank online, run Trend Micro Transaction Guard. It's free software that protects you against spyware while performing sensitive online tasks like banking or other financial transactions. Transaction Guard monitors for spyware and notifies you of any intrusions, and it provides you with an on-screen keyboard for securely entering user names and passwords.
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Transaction Guard is a FREE software that protects you against spyware while performing sensitive online tasks on a public computer, like Internet banking or other financial transactions.