How secure is enough? ⇒

I recently listened to an episode of the great Mac Power Users podcast where Katie spoke about security and it got me thinking. I use 1Password to manage all my passwords and all of my passwords are very strong (randomly generated from 1Password) so I am not overly concerned about those, except one (Apple). I am, however, concerned about the number of sites that have my crucial information, such as PayPal, Amazon and Apple. What if one of those gets hacked? The great thing about those sites having your information is that transactions are blissfully easy. The downside is that if they get hacked, then people can wreck havoc with my information. Katie suggests unique, one-time credit cards, but I don't think that I can get those from the banks I use so the next best thing is to not store my CC info with those services. I'm not a huge fan of PayPal so I may just cancel my account with them. I don't buy much on Amazon so I think I can put up with entering my CC information each time. Which brings us to the one that concerns me the most, Apple. Much of my computing usage is tied to my Apple ID. iCloud, iTunes, Apps, etc so if someone got into my account, they could do some pretty good damage. And because my wife & I share an Apple ID (share purchases, etc) I created an easy-to-remember-and-type password. Also, you *must have a credit card stored with them. TO DO: 1. remove CC info from PayPal 2. change recurring PayPal billing to credit card, if possible 3. remove billing info from Amazon 4. set wife up with 1Password 5. create better Apple password 6. review account on other services to ensure minimum info is there along with no billing info I would recommend you review and assess the amount of information you store online as well.