How to Mobile Bank Safely

As the use of mobile phones in banking transactions continues to grow, it appears that associated dangers are increasing as well. Although currently only about 3 percent of online banking customers are dabbling in mobile phone banking, the number of expected to shoot to as high as 30 percent by the end of 2010, MSN Money reports, and it remains to be seen whether everyone is banking safely.

One of the distressing facts about our new mobile computing and communications culture is the threat of predators in our midst. Criminal minds with nefarious intentions are everywhere on the Internet: thieves, scammers, and writers of malicious code long ago infiltrated the Web, bilking millions of users. Now it appears these same criminal elements are branching out into the next digital opportunity: banking from cell phones.

As history demonstrated before, we may not be completely ready to meet this new threat. When the World Wide Web was essentially established as a means of communication for ordinary consumers in the mid 1980s, users had no idea their new dial-up modem could expose them to viruses and other dangers.

Computer programmer John McAfee developed his famous anti-virus program in 1989, but it took ordinary computer users nearly five years to grasp that they needed to protect themselves from online viruses. The same slow reaction time against mobile phone threats may be history repeating itself.

Just as cyber-crooks figured out clever ways to trick computer users into turning over credit card information, PayPal accounts, eBay log-in information, and other potentially lucrative booty through email phishing scams and viral keylogger programs, now they’re setting their gazes toward our cell phones. The crooks have realized that our cell phones potentially contain easy access to bank accounts and they’re actively looking for ways to get their hands on our money or credit.