Originally Posted by Rose_P

There is no reason to assume that the Internet is the most risky place to use a credit card. It isn't by a long shot.

We are fairly sure that the person who stole our credit card info a few months ago was someone with whom we made a motel reservation over the phone. Usually I'd do that on the Internet on a secure site, but I felt I needed to verify that the place would have a dog friendly room available when we arrived. Next time I'll do the reservation online after calling about the dog. I think the secure website is safer.

Another non-Internet card theft opportunity that happens very frequently is in restaurants when the servers routinely carry the card away from your table to process them. Inappropriate charges in that situation happened twice to some friends of ours, and restaurants should be pressured to put card readers at the table.

If you go to "settings" on Paypal there is an option to have them notify you if any changes are made on your account profile. I've used Paypal for at least a dozen years without any problems. They do the best they can to keep their site safe. If they didn't they'd quickly crater! It is far preferable, in my opinion to make purchases from sites that accept Paypal than to give my card data to any random site that is selling something I would like to buy. Generally, unless it's a very well-known site I wouldn't buy from it unless they take Paypal.