'Good to Know' campaign : Google Collaborates with Citizens Advice Bureau for Online Safety

Google's first ever advertising campaign for online safety launches today, in association with the Citizens Advice Bureau. It covers topics such as choosing a password, scam emails and using two factor authentication.The company said future campaigns may deal more extensively with how Google uses people's personal data.

The two organisations by using various means and methods, like using adverts in newspapers, on public transports and online, will try to encourage users to adopt secure passwords, log out of web browsers and computers after using them and also to adopt more complex ways to sign in their email accounts which is known as "two-factor authentication".The campaign also focuses on child protection and use of 'cookies' in web browsers. This is the first campaign by Google, which is promoting something different than products such as web browser Chrome. The campaign is primarily funded by Google in consultation with CAB.

Gillian Guy, the CAB's chief executive, said that "Information's a powerful tool for preventing problems from arising in the first and safety, personal data and identity theft are among the top concerns of people of using internet".The campaign will be called "Good to Know", and will be accompanied by a website at www.google.co.uk/goodtoknow.

Five tips from Google & the Citizens Advice Bureau to stay safe online:
1. Pick a strong password. One idea you can try is to choose a line from your favourite song, film or play, like "To be or not to be, that is the question". Then use numbers, symbols and letters to recreate it: "2bon2btitq" is a password with quadrillions of variations. The more unusual the phrase you choose the better.
2. Never reply to suspicious emails with your personal or financial information, and never enter your password after following a link from an email that you don't trust.
3. Look for 'https' and a padlock to check that a site is secure. When you go into a branch of your bank, you recognise the official staff by their name, their uniforms and the services they offer you. Having this level of reassurance shouldn't be any different for online banking or other sensitive services.
4. Always sign out and shut down your browser. Ever gone out for the day and left your front door wide open? Exactly. The same principle applies when you leave yourself signed in to online accounts on the computers you use.
5. Use 2-step verification for accounts that offer it, like Google and Facebook. 2-step verification adds an extra layer of security to your account by requiring you to have access to your phone – as well as your username and password – when you sign in. This means that if someone steals or guesses your password, the potential hijacker still can't sign in to your account because they don't have your phone.