May 13th 2024
Get Safe Online, one of the world’s leading online safety resources, with websites in the UK and 25 other countries, is today launching its new ‘Self Help Centre’ – hosted on www.getsafeonline.org – which makes it easy for people to check the safety of their online activities using a range of tools all in one place. It is expected to prevent thousands of people in the UK falling victim to unwanted online scams every year.
Created for the public and small businesses, Get Safe Online’s Self Help Tool Centre – located at www.getsafeonline.org/selfhelptoolcentre – enables anyone to access, in an instant, nine easy-to-use, free tools to protect themselves, their family, finances, devices and workplace from fraud and other online harms. It is recommended that they are used in conjunction with the information and advice found elsewhere on the Get Safe Online website – with the primary aim of helping people use the internet safely, securely and with confidence.
The easy-to-use tools include ways to check whether a photo has been cloned or not, if a company is genuine and if you have been a victim of a data breach, as well as guidance on how to store passwords effectively and a brand new way to investigate whether you are at risk of oversharing on social media.
The Self Help Tool Centre also enables users an alternative way to access Check a Website – Get Safe Online’s relatively new feature where users can check if a website is likely to be genuine, before using it. Already hugely popular, Check a Website received 660,000 hits from January to March 2024 in the UK alone, and over 750,000 from around the world in the last 12 months.
Tony Neate, CEO of Get Safe Online, comments: “For over 18 years, Get Safe Online has been providing online safety advice and tips for individuals and small businesses to ensure all of us can use the internet safely and with confidence. The internet is amazing, but as with so many things, there are downfalls to look out for when using it – scams, fraud, people trying to exploit you and your personal information.
“Launching our Self Help Tool Centre today is a revolutionary initiative and we are very excited to be able to finally offer individuals and businesses the opportunity to check the safety of their online activities in an instant. It has the potential to help so many that we now just want to let as many people to know about it as possible so that the UK can benefit from this new capability and help improve the united fight against scammers.”
Liz Ziegler, Fraud & Financial Crime Director, Lloyds Banking Group, added: “Fraud is the most common crime in the UK and profoundly distressing to those who experience it, which is why it’s so important to prevent scams from happening in the first place. Resources like the Lloyds Bank Fraud Hub and those offered by Get Safe Online are critical in stopping attempted fraud in its tracks, by making it easier for people to do the research and checks needed to catch scammers in the act.”
