See this picture of my wife and me enjoying a delicious, frosty cocktail?  That was a recent vacation photo from a great trip that I took with my family a few months ago.  But, as much as we wanted to post this picture, we both knew that it just wasn’t a great idea to post any vacation photos until we had safely arrived home from our trip.

Why? Because I recently had a customer whose home was broken into while they were on vacation. During their vacation, they had posted all these great pics of themselves sunning on the beach. Along with the description, “Living in paradise for the next week.” And, with that, everyone in their social media world knew that their house would be unoccupied for a prolonged period of time…

Sharing news and posts on social media is a wonderful way to keep in touch with friends and family. If you are a “friend” of mine on either my Langlois Insurance Agency Facebook page and/or my personal Facebook page, you know that I love to share my life with my friends and family.

But, unfortunately, the reality is that sharing information on social media also means that you are sharing it with an unsavory group of criminals who are looking for access to your home, your valuables, or your person. The minute you post your vacation itinerary, thieves may be planning their own trip….breaking into your unoccupied home.

In order to avoid becoming another statistic, there are a couple of #socialmediasafety tips that I wanted to share before posting your activities on social media:

1. Really limit your network only to family and friends that you know and trust.  Do you truly know and trust all 500 of your “friends”? If not, you may want to consider eliminating those that you don’t know and trust 100%.
2. Keep silent about upcoming vacations.  Also, keep silent about being out of the house for a prolonged period of time.  For example, your son has an away baseball tournament that your whole family is going to attend?  Wait until you arrive safely back home before posting about it.
3. Be very cautious about sharing personal data such as phone numbers, your home address and birthdays.
4. Never post information about children or the elderly who may be home and vulnerable.

The access to abundant technology has changed the way we communicate. We have constant access to friends, family, and neighbors.  We just need to stay vigilant on what information we are sharing and to who we are sharing it with.

As always, if you have any additional questions, please don’t hesitate to give any of us at Langlois Insurance Agency a call at #815-485-2106.  I always love hearing from my customers!

Warmest Regards,

Matt Langlois