By Paul Goldfinger, Editor @Blogfinger, but not an expert on this subject!
There are Internet thieves who want to steal your money from your bank accounts. It is common, and the evil technologies keep improving and fooling us and our banks. This is a brief heads up:
—-To begin the process, they have to obtain details of your identity: social security numbers, bank account numbers, user name and password for online banking, birthday, address. They have a variety of techniques for getting your information, and many of them involve fooling you into giving them what they want.
—-Every time you write a check, you are handing somebody your account number, routing number, name, address and perhaps your phone number.
—-Every time you sign up for autopay with a payee, you are giving them your bank account information.
—Every time you carelessly respond to a fake bank email, you are telling them your access information to enable them to raid your bank account.
—-Every time you respond to a phone call and give the caller your personal info, you are handing them your money.
—-Every time you respond to a text message by giving your info, you are handing the bad guys what they want.
—If you have Medicare, every time you visit a doctor, you are handing over your social security number. And if you don’t have Medicare, they often ask you for your “social.” —as if saying “social” makes it any less outrageous.
—-And there are many Internet scams as well and there is credit card fraud. There are even employment scams when you try to apply for a job.
—-Once they get your information, they can then go to your bank account, remove your money (and your bank may not notice) and deposit it into a bank account at an online bank (which may be in your name, but you did not open it)
—-Talk to your bank for more info about this important topic: IT CAN HAPPEN TO YOU!! Do not give your information to anybody unless you are totally confident about your security.
—-We will share more with you as we find out more. Our commenters will help also (I hope)
Editor’s note: Received this email today (7/25/16)
This is a fraudulent email. Never click on a link such as the one above (“sign on to account summary”). There are other clues such as the return address “no reply2….” In addition, if you try to forward it somewhere, such as your bank, it might not send. If it won’t send, print it and then give the print to your bank of scan it and send the scan file. Wells Fargo has a special address for suspicious emails.—–PG