I posted this in the feedback thread, but I feel it's helpful enough that it deserves more exposure.

1. Use Adblock Plus. I know Keith suggested turning it off, but I really feel strongly about this. Do not do any offers without Adblock installed and active. It will prevent all kinds of pop-ups, redirects, and automatic downloads. It's available for all major browsers, and is a must-have for internet security.

2. Read the fine print before you click. It tells you what you have to do to earn credits, which may include downloading software or providing credit card information. If you have to do anything like that, avoid the offer entirely.

Here's the fine print I'm talking about:

(Click to enlarge)

3. Try role playing. This might be more of a personal preference, but I don't like to give out any real demographic information. Instead, I basically make up a character to use for offers. As far as they're concerned, I'm a blonde 20-something year old wannabe-actress making minimum wage in LA. :P They'll still get some of my genuine opinions and feedback, but they don't need to know who I really am or where I live.

4. Use a throwaway email account. Don't use your real email address, because you'll be buried in spam and crap. A quick google search for "throwaway email" brings up several sites. Mailinator, guerrillamail, and 10minutemail are all good. You don't have to sign up, and they give you a random email address to use.

Sometimes you'll come across an offer that's blacklisted one of these sites (they'll tell you the email address isn't valid.) If that happens, just try another. There's usually at least one they overlooked and they'll accept it.

5. If they ask what industry you work in in order to "match you with a survey," don't say you work in advertising, marketing, or legal. That basically tells them that you know all their advertising tricks and they'll blacklist you for being too smart. Just tell them you're a mindless drone working in retail or customer service or something. (No offense to anyone in those industries :P)

6. Keep an eye on Subeta and watch for the event telling you the CSC came through. Once you see that, just drop everything and stop whatever survey or other offer you're on. They have a tendency to funnel you directly from one survey to the next to try to get you to do more than you have to for the CSC. You have no obligation to keep going once they credit your account.

7. Trust your instincts. If you feel at all uncomfortable with an offer, don't do it. No amount of CSC is worth risking your personal information or your computer's security.

Thank you so very much for making this topic, very VERY solid tips there! I still don't think I could trust myself enough to do these offers but for those who do, hopefully this helps them tenfold! Thanks again!

Here are a few sites and addons I use. I think these will come in handy for people who want to try these offers.

NoScript for Firefox. Since it blocks scripts by default, it can stop some of the nastier crap before it has a chance to do any damage. Good for stopping dodgy redirects, amongst other things. Users will need to whitelist sites they trust in order for them to work though. Probably best avoided by anyone who's not too confident with computers.

Web of Trust. Not always helpful (it's dependant on user reviews), but a good place to check if you want to see whether or not a site is trustworthy. Subeta's score, for example.. Background colour is a quick indicator. Green for safe, yellow for caution, red for... Stay the hell away? :P

They have an addon for multiple browsers which makes checking sites easier. You can right click on a link and Check WoT Scorecard from the menu.

Blur addon from Abine. Free addon with some optional paid features. Masked emails are one of the free features. You have to register an account to use it, but then you can create throwaway addresses which forwards emails to your real one. If you start getting spammed, you can just delete the fake address to stop it forwarding any more.