In an age of growing identity theft and personal fraud, protecting your personal information is of great importance. If you’ve used the Internet to score yourself free stuff it won’t take you long to realise that along with the many benefits of online freebies there are also some potential dangers to be aware of, especially when it comes to sharing your personal information and contact details. This article provides some great assistance that will make your search for freebies more secure and successful.
1. Use a dedicated email address
It’s good habit to set up at least one email address dedicated just to signing up for free offers. If you don’t, you run the possibility of spam and unsavoury emails flooding your personal inbox. Your work email address should unquestionably not be used! Some free offers only allow one sample per email address but not household address. Therefore, if you’re a serious freebies hunter, consider using various email addresses to take advantage of this fact. By using more than one email address you can accept the same offer two or three times.
If you are looking to set up a dedicated email address for freebies, I highly recommended a service such as Gmail. It’s free and it offers great security and spam blocking. Another advantage of using Gmail is the ability to create instant disposable email addresses that are linked to the same account. Just add +whatever to the username part of your email address. So if your email address was johndoe@gmail, in the freebies sign up form you would simply enter your email address as johndoe+freebies@gmail.com. You’d still get all emails sent to this address as usual, but if things ever get out of hand, you can simply create a filter to direct all mail sent to this address straight to your junk folder or trash.
2. Use a virtual voicemail service
You may also find it helpful to have a virtual voicemail. Some free offers require a working phone number. Free accounts are readily accessible at sites like evoice.com and are relatively easy to set up. All of the messages left in your voicemail will be sent to you as an email or alternatively you can call and listen to the messages if you wish. By setting up a virtual voicemail you will avoid any telemarketers and sales people that might otherwise pester you.
3. Use a PO Box
This is for the serious free stuff hunter or those wanting that extra level of protection. Using a Post Office Box service is an effective way to supply another layer of anonymity when supplying your details to freebie providers. Mail also typically arrives faster at a PO Box than at a residential or business address. If you use it for your other personal mail it can also provide a permanent address for you, which is especially useful if you move around a lot. Please note that there is a cost for this service, but depending on what your requirements are it can be quite affordable with prices starting from $10 for six months. Enquire at your local post office for more information.
With these great tips you can now hunt for free stuff, freebies and other giveaways with more confidence. Go forth and sign away!
More about FreeStuff4Free
FreeStuff4Free.com is a website that specialises in finding freebies, free samples and freebies. This site is visually compelling and easier to navigate than text based free sites. The site is updated daily and dead links removed regularly. There are no scams and all freebies are 100% legitimate.
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