Users are Their Own Worst Enemy for Online Privacy

As much heat as Facebook has taken recently for its privacy policies and the freedom with which it shares data across the Web and around the world, Facebook is still not the biggest threat to online privacy–you are. A study by Consumer Reports illustrates that users are really their own worst enemy when it comes to online privacy.

Here are some of the key findings of the Consumer Reports survey:

• A projected 1.7 million online households had experienced online identity theft in the past year.

• An estimated 5.4 million online consumers submitted personal information to e-mail (phishing) scammers during the past two years.

• Among adult social network users, 38 percent had posted their full birth date, including year. Forty-five percent of those with children had posted their children's photos. And 8% had posted their own street address.

• An estimated 5.1 million online households had experienced some type of abuse on a social network in the past year, including malware infections, scams, and harassment.

You can read the full article here.