| This week, we asked what you do to protect yourself online and for the most outrageous scam story you know. You guys were all over the map with this one, which makes sense, since it seems like the technology landscape is constantly evolving. Ann described a frightening grandparent scam that nearly cost her mother a lot of money, and now she feels inspired to learn how to protect herself. She writes: "I will promise myself to look into all of these smart suggestions to make myself more scam-proof! And I will try to help my mom to become scam-proof too!" We're delighted that we could be a resource. And speaking of resources: Lois suggests using a robocall foiler like Nomorobo, and Sophie has a password trick she learned long before password managers that you'll be happy she shared. Our tech columnist, Geoffrey A. Fowler, wrote about using a password manager. We wrote about designing effective passwords awhile ago, and it still appears to be solid advice for creating and managing your own. (You know, until it isn't.) (It's never too late to send us a tip of your own! Tell us how you scam-proof your identity here. We may feature it.) Below you'll find a few of our favorite submissions, edited for length and clarity. Foil the grandparent scam"Our son was living in Buenos Aires, teaching English, when my active, smart 80-plus-year-old mother received a call from someone claiming to be him. In her excitement, she fed all of the pertinent information to the scammer as they spoke on the phone. 'Hi Grandma!'... 'Oh, is this Daniel?'...'Yes, it's me....Dan.' 'Oh my, are you calling all the way from Argentina?' The scammer told her that he was at a wedding of a college friend and was in a car accident after drinking at the reception and thrown in jail with a broken nose. He needed $5,000 to pay bail and didn't want his parents to know. My mom wanted to help her beloved grandson, so she went to her bank to withdraw $5,000! Fortunately, the teller knew my mom well and pleaded with her to call me, and told her that this was a very common scam. She called me, and I assured her that our son had not been to a wedding and was not in a car accident or thrown in an Argentine jail! Yikes!" — Ann, 60ish Zap those robocalls"I signed up for Nomorobo. It doesn't stop all the calls, but at least half of the robocalls coming to my home landline are 'zapped' after the first ring by Nomorobo. Since I work at home, that's a big help. There's a version for cellphones too, but it isn't free and it isn't nearly as effective as the free landline service." — Lois, 56 "Hack" your passwords"A friend gave me a great idea at least a decade ago. Your passwords are safest when they are different for each site you visit, but keeping track of so many passwords is challenging. He suggested coming up with a formula for your passwords that is the same every time, but that is customized to each site based on the name of the site. So, for instance, maybe your formula is: The last two letters of the website you're on, followed by the month you were born, followed by your favorite sports team, and ending with a symbol (!). That way the first two letters of your password change every time, but the rest of it is the same and easy to remember. It has been a life saver!" — Sophie, 53 "I like to use a password manager called LastPass. LastPass securely stores passwords and can be accessed from any device I use. But consider the consequences if a service like LastPass gets hacked. Using a long sentence (a passphrase) can be more secure and easier to remember than a random sequence of letters and numbers." — Rob, 27 Always be skeptical"Mostly, I just don't do it. I don't use social media. Texts and phone calls are fine. I have a smartphone, but I only got it because I needed to get the bus schedules. (And when I turned off the location information, this stopped working. So that was bad advice.) I check my credit rating regularly, so I know if anything is going wrong. I reported one scam, after telling them I was going to do so, and it has stopped. I do use Amazon a lot, as I no longer drive, so I let them collect my data since if that is the only way I can have access to them. But it is my choice. I don't use ones I don't know and that I have not approached." — Elaine, 85 "I would never click on an ad on Facebook or any social media. To me that's just asking for trouble. I keep all my passwords in a good, old-fashioned paper address book. They are filed by letter (my Facebook username and password is under 'F'). It's a book I keep hidden and that I can put in a home safe when we are away. I generally don't answer the telephone unless I recognize the number. If it's important, they'll leave a message. I check my bank accounts online almost daily and have systems set up to notify me by text or email if any strange or large purchases are made on our accounts." — Victoria, 58 "Check the email sender's address. It will always have some telling appendage that informs you where it originates. And never click on an embedded link … always call the company directly on a known phone number. Of all the telemarketing calls I have received, none was funnier than the Caller ID saying 'Jail Inmate!'" — Charles, 71 On Monday, Suzette will talk about her favorite ubiquitous accessory, reading glasses, and how they relate to vision health and well-being. In the meantime, be sure to forward Bold School to a family member or friend and invite them to join us! They can sign up at anytime and start with Lesson 1 the following Monday. | 
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