With the use of mobile phones growing exponentially, banks have dived into providing internet banking services using those phones. The services provided can include an option for a web browser link, a downloadable app to access user accounts, or a text based system to retrieve balances and history.
Mobile banking provides users with the ability to view their account balances real time on their phone, view history of those accounts, transfer money between accounts, as well as providing bill pay and person to person payment services.
Banking with a cell phone is typically more secure than banking using a computer. With a cell phone, the person using the phone cannot add bill pay users, change the password, or modify any settings. Those settings need to be done through a computer. If the cell phone is stolen or lost, this prevents the person that has the possession of the phone from taking the funds in the accounts and transferring to an account that is not the phone owners.
The phone is also part of the authentication process. If the phone attempting to access the users account information has not been setup through the computer in Internet Banking, the phone cannot access the users’ accounts. The system matches the serial number of the phone accessing to the serial number of the phone setup, so is difficult to bypass this security feature.
Once the cell phone is authenticated with the Internet Banking system, the downloadable app typically requires only a password, and occasionally an answer to a security question, to be entered to access account information.
Mobile banking is the ultimate on-demand service. It is safe, it is secure!
