According to Australian Bureau of Statistics, 6 million Australians are exposed to scams and fraud each year and around 800,000 fall victim in some way.

However, by observing some basic commonsense behaviours, you can minimise your chances of becoming one of these disturbing statistics.

Here are 10 great tips from AVG to help protect your identity from unscrupulous scammers:

1. Don’t throw away anything that contains personal information unless it has been shredded or ripped up to make the document illegible. So shred the following: bank statements, utility bills, application forms, chequebook stubs, card receipts and letters that have personal details. Today a smart burglar wouldn’t bother breaking into your home and taking household goods and personal items. Instead they’d just steal identity-related documents. An even smarter one wouldn’t even break in. They’d just go through your mailbox and rubbish bin.

2. Be aware of phishing phone calls – if someone asks you to give away personal information over the phone, check their details and get a phone number to call the organisation back to check they are legitimate.

3. Be very alert online – phishing attacks are a growing problem. Keep your email address as private as possible and don’t fall for emails asking you for personal information like bank account details, usernames, passwords or credit card details. A legitimate bank or financial institution will never email you asking you to follow a link or asking you for personal details. Report these scam attacks to www.scamwatch.gov.au.

4. Be careful when using social networking sites, as these can be an easy route to snatching your data. You could be giving up your personal details to the bad guys, crooks with fake profiles, or the friends of your friends who you can’t possibly know and trust. When you next log on to social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, check and set the privacy settings on your accounts so that you’re only divulging information to those you truly trust. Please be very circumspect as to what personal information you post on social media web sites.

5. Always go directly to web sites asking for personal information rather than clicking on links in an email or web site page.

6. Only conduct an internet transaction if you are sure the web site is valid and secure. The rise of the internet has created a playing field for fraudsters – always ensure a web site is secure before providing personal details or account information.

7. Remember to set strong passwords. Last year, 20,000 Yahoo, AOL and Hotmail passwords were hacked only to find the most popular password was 123456. Try to use a combination of letters and numbers and change your passwords regularly.

8. Monitor your credit card and/or bank statements and look for suspicious transactions. Also check your credit status regularly; this way you’ll be aware who is doing credit searches on you and if any new accounts have been set up in your name. Contact Veda Advantage or Dun & Bradstreet to get a copy of your credit file.

9. If you move house then have your post forwarded for at least six months to prevent important mail with personal details landing on someone else’s doormat.

10. Go with your gut feel. If it sounds too good to be true then it probably is. If you’re suspicious as to whether an offer or request is genuine then get independent advice from a trusted advisor, family member or friend.

However, this text more often than not has formatting applied, particularly if it’s been created in Microsoft Word, and I need it to be in ‘plain text’ without any of the bolding, italics and other extraneous enhancements.

I have been copying the text I want to extract, pasting it into a basic text program like Notepad, then copying it into my blog’s text editor — a real pain in the neck and a time waster.

Like most people, I’ve learned to use Word on a ‘needs to know basis’ over the years; it’s not usually until I strike a problem that I go looking for a shortcut or workaround to solve it. So, I thought I’d see if there was an easier way to strip formatting from Word.

Well, good old Google came through yet again. I found a simple video on the Woopid site that gave me the good oil on how to strip formatting in Word simply. (Check out some of the other videos while you’re there to pick up some handy shortcuts and tips.)

In Word 2007, all you need to do is make sure you’re on the Home tab, highlight the text you need, then click on the Clear Formatting button in the Font box (it appears in the top right-hand corner — hover your mouse over the icon for confirmation that you’ve got the right button).

In Windows 2003, click on Styles and Formatting on the Formatting toolbar, then click on Clear Formatting.

If you want to get up to speed with a whole range of features in Word that you may not already be aware of, I suggest you head to the Microsoft Office Online site and work your way through the free demos you’ll find there.

However, there are so many terrific features under the hood if you know where to look, which allow you to accomplish some incredible results. The problem is, how do you know where to get to them?

Well, MakeUseOf.com has come to the rescue with a beginners guide to using Photoshop which you can find here. And that includes people like me, who have the program, but currently only use it for simple tasks such as cropping screenshots and resizing happy snaps.

If you don’t have Photoshop, but would like to give it a road-test to see how you like it, you can download a trial version from here.

Now, Photoshop doesn’t come cheap and is well out of the league of most consumers, but you can pick up a copy of Photoshop Elements, which includes all but the most high-end features of it’s more illustrious sibling for under $160.

If you are a student, there are awesome discounts to be had on Adobe products site here (check out the eligibility requirements here). Adobe also has arrangements with most state education departments for substantial discounts for teachers on its products, so if you are a teacher, contact your relevant state department for details.

Introductory Photoshop skills for the beginning photographer

I’d have scoffed at such advice myself not that long ago. However, as I’ve amassed more and more tech gadgets, and as many chargers and cables are no longer being branded with the device manufacturer’s name (why is that?), I’ve become the proud owner of a bag full of chargers and cables, and I don’t have a clue which device they go with.

Granted, I probably have more than the average number of gadgets, thanks to how I earn my livelihood, but as tech gadgets get more affordable and we upgrade them more often, it’s a problem that many people are already facing or will do so in the not-too-distant future.

How you label your accessories is up to you. I tend to use a long, rectangular sticky label (you can get packs of them for a couple of dollars at your local liquidation store), which I wrap around the cord and stick the ends to each other to form a tag.

Whichever method of identification you choose, it’s a good habit to get into — and you’ll be very thankful down the track.

Since I started labelling my cords and cables in this way, I haven’t been responsible for one single orphan accessory!