Two in a Room Studios

PayPal is a quick and no fuss way to send and receive payments for your business online, but some of the default security settings can be tightened quickly and easily.

When you ring PayPal customer service they will verify your account with you in one of three ways. The default method is to confirm the last 4 digits of your credit card/bank account. This isn’t the most secure of methods, so you should change your Identification Preferences–here’s how;

1. Login to PayPal
2. Click > Profile in the menu bar
3. Look under Account Information (first column)
4. Click Identification Preferences (the last item)
5. The first option “Customer Service Pin” is greyed out, click create one on the right
6. Enter your desired 6 digit code and store it somewhere safe, like an encrypted password storage program, where only you can access it. Try “OneNote” for Windows or “Yojimbo” for Mac
7. Once created select the Customer Service PIN option
8. Click Save
9. Logout

This tip was first heard on the Security Now Podcast.