To view our videos, you need to
enable JavaScript. Learn how.
install Adobe Flash 9 or above. Install now.

Then come back here and refresh the page.

Holiday shoppers could be putting their bank account number, credit cards and even passwords in the hands of thieves. Many keep that information and much more right on their cell phones.

Tech writer Jennifer Jolly of tecca.com says plenty of people fail to safeguard their cell and portables the way they do their main computer at home.

“Get some kind of software, like McAfee has one that works across all your gadgets,” says Jolly, “get virus protection on your smartphone, on your tablet, and of course on your computer, and you shouldn’t have to pay more than around $100 or so to protect all of your gadgets.”

Keep from sharing information with prying eyes.

“A lot of people are banking with their smartphone and tablet. I was standing behind somebody on the subway the other day and they were checking their bank account information on their tablet. Had I been a cyber criminal, I could’ve just taken a picture of that bank account number on my cell phone,” says Jolly.

There’s more than just finances to worry about, though. Consider photos of people living it up at office Christmas parties. Some look real, a few might be staged, and all could be considered downright embarrassing.

“Cyber criminals can lift your photos,” says Jolly.

A phone with weak password protection and software can lead a thief to not only personal finance data, but personal photos.

“I know a horror story of a woman that happened to. Her husband traveled all the time, she took a picture, meant to just share it with her husband, it became like a billboard,” says Jolly.

Whether taken on purpose or in the middle of partying, do pay some attention to how you might look to someone later.

In the age of cell phone cameras and instant video uploads, we are all a shutter click away from becoming famous, or in some cases, infamous.