ONLINE BANKING SAFETY & AVOIDING SCAMS

The Internet is a staple in our lives. It’s hard to imagine a day without it. We shop, pay bills, have doctor appointments, and bank online practically every day. And, as technology continues to evolve, so do the scams and schemes of cybercriminals and identity thieves. Because your information security is our priority, we promote online banking safety across our products and services. 

Take a moment to learn more about some common online banking scams and review the following tips to strengthen your online banking safety.

Threats To Your Online Banking Safety

Imposters Scam

These scammers are often the hardest to avoid. They’re sophisticated and use the element of surprise to capture your information. This is how they work:

• Making contact via a call, text message, or email.

• Pretending they are from your credit union, a government agency, or an insurance company.

• Ask you to verify your personal or financial information or request a password reset.

Just Remember: No legitimate company will contact you directly or ask for payments using gift cards, wire transfers, or direct transfers from person to person.

Urgency Scams

“It’s urgent that you make a payment now.” “You only have 24 hours to respond to this offer!” “You’ve won our grand prize. Click now to claim it.” Scammers use urgent, time-sensitive messaging, tricking you into taking action without thinking it through.

Avoid responding if:

• The big deal you’re considering requires you to fill out a personal profile, create a new account, or enter your financial information.

• You receive what looks like an official email from a known company asking for your information it should have already.

• Threaten the safety of you or your loved ones if you don’t pay a fine or fees or provide personal and financial details.

If you feel something isn’t right, trust your gut. Contact the company or government agency that supposedly sent you the urgent email or text message to see if the request is valid.

Phishing Scam

This popular scam follows these steps:

• Sending official-looking communication via text, email, or on social media.

• Sophisticated methods make it easy to trick you into providing your credit union online banking login credentials or other financial information.

• Identify fraudulent communications by checking for grammatical errors, misspelled words, logos that seem "off", or the sender information is a personal email.

Utility Scam

You'll get a call from a "service provider" at your trusted utility company. Some things to keep in mind:

• Utility companies do not call customers asking for last-minute payments.

• Contact your utility company to investigate possible fraudulent account activity.

• The scammer may threaten to have your utility shut off if you don’t pay immediately.

Support Specialist Scam

Another tricky scenario; someone posing as a customer support specialist from a known company contacts you to gain access to your accounts or mobile devices. To make your online banking safety more robust, here are ways in which scammers will reach out you need to look out for:

• By text or email - sometimes by phone

• Through social media channels

• Unsolicited “coupon” codes for popular businesses

Again, we encourage you to contact the business that supposedly reached out to you. Take that opportunity to verify the communication is legitimate.

Pay Yourself Scam

Often in a text or via email, you'll receive a fraud alert from your credit union. Some of how you’re tricked:

• A credit union representative asks you to approve an unknown transaction.

• This representative claims to be your credit union’s online banking safety specialist who will help you avoid fraud if you send money to yourself performing a transfer or person-to-person payment.

• Some scammers go so far as replicating your credit union’s website, compromising your online banking safety when you log in to online banking.

Being A Fraud Fighter

With the online banking safety protocols we offer, you’ll have layers of additional product and service security.

We invite you to read through the following tips to leave scammers in the dust:

• Create unique passwords with capital letters, numbers, and symbols.

• Use two-factor authentication that sends you a code by email or text to confirm it’s you logging in.

• Public Wi-Fi and computers are not recommended for online banking safety as they compromise your information and create a data breach.

• Text alerts are essential for identifying suspicious transactions and account activity.

• Never give out personal information - to anyone.

• Protect your devices with complicated passwords and antivirus software.

• Download your credit union’s official Mobile App, which you can check for legitimacy by searching for it on Google Play or the App Store.

Your online banking safety is beyond important, so turn to us if you engage in what you feel is suspicious activity. We’ll guide you through adding any safety measures to your accounts that you may not already have in place. 

For questions or help, send us a message any time, or give us a call.