Yankee 2.0

Dear Anne, Being a Luddite -- & all FOrumites know that I am a Luddite -- I have never used online banking, although I do maintain my credit card info from the bank online (to know how much I'm spending as the weeks go by -- I pay ahead of getting my statement almost every month.)   But I have an unique reason.  I receive public benefits such as Social Security Disability Insurance Benefits.  Periodically, redetermination forms have to be filled out, & bank staetments & canceled checks enclosed.  These documents have to be on touchable original paper.  Also, my 2 biggest creditors, my personal physician, Peter ($600), & my Section 8 rent ($192) do not accept electronic payments.  SO, even though I personally would be interested in going onlline w a secure connection (DSL at home) to bank, I cannot do it.  BTW, I would NEVER use the web for keeping track of my money, although there are some FREE budgeting tools out there.

I think a lot of people worry about having their identity stolen or their accounts compromised by hackers, yet the overwhelming majority of cases of identity theft do *not* occur online.  In fact, back when we were with Bank of America, we were in fact victims of identity theft, and the crime did not involve a computer at all.  Instead, a crooked bank employee gave our account information (and many other people's, apparently) to a ring of thieves.  One of these thieves simply walked into a bank branch with a fake ID and walked out with thousands of dollars of our money.  This experience convinced me that there's nothing inherently safer about a bricks-and-mortar bank than a virtual one.  At least with an online bank, it takes a skilled hacker to get at your money, not just a garden-variety thief with an accomplice on the inside.

Fortunately our story has a happy ending.  I discovered the fraud within a couple of days--because I logged onto online banking to pay a bill and noticed two large withdrawals I hadn't made.  So using online banking actually enabled us to detect the crime more quickly and take the necessary steps to resolve the problem.  We had to go through a fair amount of hassle, but the bank did restore our funds and take the investigation of the crime upon itself.  And I feel confident that if we had lost our money to a hacker instead of a common thief, the outcome would have been the same.

In short, I feel that the convenience of online banking far outweighs the trivial risk associated with using it from a firewall-protected home computer (especially if it's a Mac).  Even if a hacker does get in (and keep in mind, that could happen even if you don't use online banking, because the bank's own records are computerized), the account is insured and the bank will make good the loss.