Ensuring Your Safety With Online Dating Sites

Tips and advice on how best to protect yourself when signing-up for an online dating website.

The world is hardly a safe place to live in at the moment. With all sorts of violent crimes happening on a daily basis, the news is always full of rapes, fraud and attacks. This is hardly painting a great picture but you do hear of plenty of problems, especially as some of them are linked to online dating sites. However, not all online dating sites are unsafe, and you can help to protect yourself as well.

You should only ever use secure online dating sites. Those that offer assurances and are backed up by secure payment systems are always the best option. You can check this in the information given on the site itself as well as via the payment system. For example, the web address of the online dating site will be displayed as beginning with https:// rather than http://. There will also be a small lock appear in the frame of your browser. This ensures that your payment details will remain secure. In terms of your own personal details, good dating sites will ask you for your details in order to verify that you are in fact human but will also allow you to choose what you reveal and what you do not.

You can also guard your personal details when using online dating sites by following these suggestions:

• Never reveal your phone number - This is a recipe for disaster and plenty of crank calls. The safest way to communicate when online dating is via the site itself or via email. Never give your number to someone until after you meet him or her for the first time.
• Never reveal where you live - Again, this is a recipe for disaster. When you do arrange a date, both of you should make arrangements to get there yourself. As such, you have no need to reveal your home address until you get to know your date well.
• Choose your picture very carefully - It should not reveal anything about you or your home. You should not feature any expensive personal possessions, the outside of your home, your car number plate or anything else that could make you a target. Online dating pictures may be seen by thousands so play it safe.
• Never divulge your daily routine or a specific work location - Stalkers and potential attackers may well target people that they have found via online dating as a result of their workplace or places that are part of a daily routine (the gym for example). Do not reveal this information. Of course, this only happens in a minority of cases but the risk just is not worth it.
• Always meet in a busy and public location - This is just basic offline and online dating safety. You do not know anything about your date when you meet them other than what they he or she has told you so just be careful. Your well being is the most important thing.

 

If your interested in dating online, then visit Dating The UK - a safe environment where you can meet like-minded people.

 

So now you know some tips for safer online dating.  Be sure to check out my #1 online dating site, FriendFinder.com, a great online dating membership site with great security. 

By Robyn Manson Published: 7/18/2008