Yesterday, I attended a presentation, courtesy of STAPLES and hosted by Tory Johnson, the Workplace Contributor on ABC’s Good Morning America, about hot, holiday gifts and gadgets (more on that in the next post).
One of the items that received the most comment was a nifty Shredder (the Staples MailMate M3) that is small enough to sit on a desktop and costs just $79.99 . This particular shredder not only cuts up paper, but entire packets of bulk mail and can even cut through paperclips, staples, and plastic such as unwanted credit cards and CDs.
A few people wondered, why bother shredding anything? Every second, two more people become victims of identity theft, Web threats or data loss. Recycling bins and garbage cans are the ideal source for dumpster diving criminals to get your personal information. Ripping something in half isn’t safe enough –they can find the two halves and piece them together, easily. However, shredding unwanted material makes it more difficult identity thieves to make you a victim. Staples has a nifty, quick little test that will let you see how well you are protecting yourself against identity theft in general. I took it, and realized that even though I’m pretty good at thwarting the criminals, I still had a little to learn. The free test is at: www.staples.com/securitybystaples. It is worth a look, especially with the holidays approaching.
Thanks to STAPLES (and the AdviceSisters), your holidays can be a bit safer.
*the holographic nature of CDs make them into pretty (if somewhat sharp) confetti that might just inspire you in your next craft project!