When Gina Field was scrolling through Facebook she came across a photo about a family holiday that left her gobsmacked.

In the photo, this family was all smiles, they had their thumbs up, wearing matching T-shirts, standing outside their home, with their car in the background.

Their happiness was apparently due to the fact they were about to embark on a 10-day cruise, hence the T-shirts, Field assumes.

It may seem like an innocent enough photo, but Field is an operational security expert and the founder of Nepean Regional Security.

She instantly knew the photo was a bad idea.

It was posted in a community Facebook group, so it’s not a far stretch to assume the family lives in that area. One could possibly find the home they were posing outside of, or if that fails, their car’s registration was also visible in the photo.

And the family is away for 10 days, meaning there’s a good chance no one would be home if someone with nefarious intentions decided to take all of their belongings.

Stop sharing your holiday plans

Field told The New Daily she finds posts such as these to be mind boggling.

“I don’t know whether they’re getting really excited [about a holiday] or they feel like they need to share all of this with people,” she said.

Her warning is plain and simple: Stop sharing your holiday plans on social media.

By sharing your intentions on leaving your home unattended for any period of time is essentially just giving a gift to burglars.

Although sharing your holiday plans might leave someone like Field dumbfounded, she does understand on some level why people do it.

Social media is the perfect medium to boast about all that is good in your life, so naturally, some want to share with their loved ones that they are about to enjoy some downtime.

You just need to be smart about it and Field has a bit of advice that should allow you to enjoy your holiday, post about it and not worry about someone breaking into your home.

You can select who sees your pictures and posts on Facebook. When posting something, there should be a “sharing with” option, where you can choose who sees the post, either just you, friends, public or custom.

By choosing “custom” you can select a few people with whom you want to share your posts.

“I would tell them to select their groups on Facebook wisely, who they’re pre-sharing their holiday with and during,” Field said.

“And then they can just knock themselves out when they come back and say ‘we’re back from an amazing holiday, it was great, here’s our happy snappies’,” she suggested.

Brag about your holiday when you’re back, not before or during. Photo: Getty

Other tips to keep your home safe during the holidays

Field has worked in the security space for more than 35 years and has seen plenty of break-ins.

Even businesses that announce their plans to shut over holidays have fallen victim to thieves, she explained, and likened it to people posting their holidays on social media.

It’s not just people being away from their home or workplace over Christmas that could be seen as an invitation for thieves.

She notes that sometimes objects in the window can catch the wrong person’s eye.

One Christmas Day, Field attended a home that had been burgled.

She believes the thief in this particular instance was attracted to the nativity scene displayed in the window and the presents under the Christmas tree.

When Christmas decorations are hung up outside, sometimes they require electricity, but many buildings won’t have exterior power points.

Some people might run the cord through the garage door or a cracked window.

“Just be really mindful of that, because with any sort of gap you can actually just pop the windows and the garage doors open.

“I mean, garage doors are flimsy anyway, but I always recommend putting extra locks, as in drop bolts.”

She also suggests making sure there is a deadlock on an internal door that connects to a garage to ensure the contents of your home are safe.

The best and simplest thing you can do is ensure everything is shut and locked when leaving the home.

Another little tip that will help people with CCTV cameras or a security system is to get a lock for the electrical box, so the power can’t be cut to render such devices useless.

If you are going away, maybe ask your neighbour to keep an eye on things if you trust them.

Or if you have pets, consider a pet sitter to mind the house, Field said.