000 000 0000
Last week, got several calls from 000 000 0000. One day it one after the other on Verizon cell phone Then we got one at home on AT&T land line, maybe more. SIL answered it. they asked who it was an...
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Just a general comment about security:
Banks love internet access because it saves them a LOT of money, which they then pass on in the form of gigantic bonuses for bankers. This means that they want internet banking to succeed, so they've gone out of their way to reimburse customers who have lost money to fraud, even when it's the customer's own fault, or can be construed that way in court.
This can't last forever. Increasingly, customers are held liable for fraud that is not explicitly the bank's fault, ie a hostile takeover of the bank's web site. If a customer unknowingly gives a crook enough information to guess their password and access their account, they stand to lose the funds in their account.
Many people on this website love their pets enough to talk about them online. And some of those people display their real names, their email address, and even their phone number.
The most common security question if you forget your password is "What is your favorite pet's name?". Russian gangs are assembling a database of names, email addresses and pet names. With your actual phone number they can call you up and fill in any blanks they need in order to hijack your email account and tell your bank they forgot your password and to email them a new one.
That's all they need to write themsleves a nice check out of your account.
This kind of fraud is considered the customer's fault, and it's already in our contracts. But in most cases the bank pays it, because they don't want customers to get the impression that internet banking is risky. But as the average customer gets more sophisticated about security, the rest of us have to play catch up, because eventually most customers will agree that internet banking is perfectly safe--as long as you don't give away your password. And that will be good enough for them to tell us our losses are our own fault.
Banks love internet access because it saves them a LOT of money, which they then pass on in the form of gigantic bonuses for bankers. This means that they want internet banking to succeed, so they've gone out of their way to reimburse customers who have lost money to fraud, even when it's the customer's own fault, or can be construed that way in court.
This can't last forever. Increasingly, customers are held liable for fraud that is not explicitly the bank's fault, ie a hostile takeover of the bank's web site. If a customer unknowingly gives a crook enough information to guess their password and access their account, they stand to lose the funds in their account.
Many people on this website love their pets enough to talk about them online. And some of those people display their real names, their email address, and even their phone number.
The most common security question if you forget your password is "What is your favorite pet's name?". Russian gangs are assembling a database of names, email addresses and pet names. With your actual phone number they can call you up and fill in any blanks they need in order to hijack your email account and tell your bank they forgot your password and to email them a new one.
That's all they need to write themsleves a nice check out of your account.
This kind of fraud is considered the customer's fault, and it's already in our contracts. But in most cases the bank pays it, because they don't want customers to get the impression that internet banking is risky. But as the average customer gets more sophisticated about security, the rest of us have to play catch up, because eventually most customers will agree that internet banking is perfectly safe--as long as you don't give away your password. And that will be good enough for them to tell us our losses are our own fault.
