One Friday about a month ago, I came home from work to find three messages on my phone. (Yes, landline. You think I give out my cellphone number to anybody?) One was a Caller Unknown with an area code in West Virginia who hung up. The second was from my local bank, also hung up. The third was the bank again, with a young woman asking me to call back.
I had to work on Saturday, and so would be unable to get to the bank until Monday. I went on-line to the bank website to see if my money was still there. I had never signed up for on-line banking. It began asking for account numbers. I backed out. It's not that I don't trust my bank's system. It's that between my computer and the bank's computer there are a whole bunch of wire and tubes and who knows who may be listening in.
(Turned out someone in WV had both my account number *and* my SSN, and was trying to cash a check. Unfortunately for them, my account had insufficient funds. I told Equifax and the rest not to approve any loans in my name, and I changed all my passwords to "the name of the song you invented with your friend Mike to sing the praises of the 1974 Cubs.")
The few times that I've experienced anything close to bank hacking has been with credit cards - and always either while I was preparing to leave on a vacation, or while I was on a vacation.
We were preparing to head to Hawaii in 1998 when I received a notification of suspicious activity on my mastercard - "Did you make two $500 purchases as some intelligible website in Wyoming, an hour apart?" Ah, nope. "Great, we'll just cancel your card and mail you a replacement..." I'm leaving for Hawaii at 6AM tomorrow morning, and all of my reservations are held on that card. "OK... well, you should be okay. Can we mail the replacement card to your hotel in Hawaii?" How long might that take? "We will send it FedEX, it should be there in 2 days." So I figured that the card would either get to Hawaii before I arrived, or would be delivered in Hawaii after I had already left. - It did, in fact arrive in two days.
More recently while I was in Phoenix AZ for my Goddaughter's wedding in 2023, my credit card company sent a message through the card app, a txt message, and a phone call to my cell to ask if I had just ordered $190 worth of Pizza in Fresno. No, I'm currently in Arizona. "Perhpas family used the card to order pizza while you're in Arizona?" - Ah, no, I live three hours away from Fresno in the Sierra Nevada foothills, and no one has this card besides me, and it is here in my wallet. As the call went on "Did you just order another $147 worth of pizza from a different restaurant in Fresno?" No, I've been on the phone with you for 12 minutes. "OK, we'll cancel your card and mail a replacement." Eh, I'm paying for this hotel/resort with the card we're discussing - is it possible to use the card when I check out in a day? "No, I just cancelled that card." - I used another card I had with me, but gads, the timing. I guess at least they were proactive about the potential fruad.
If I remember correctly, the full Depression barrel ensemble was the barrel, the two suspenders (nailed inexpertly to the outside of the barrel), shoes with the sole flapping *plus spats* (very important), a derby hat, white gloves, and a cigar butt being daintily held with a toothpick.
As someone in tech support, we advise the following rule for password creation: "Your password must be between 732 and 942 characters. It cannot be the same as any word in any known language. It must include 3 heiroglyphs, ancient Babylonian text and the solution to Fermat's last theorem." However, the solution to Fermat's last theorem has recently been posted online, so we are in the process of changing that requirement.
As far as I can tell I've never been 'hacked' or given away my personal information as a result of a phishing or mishing attack. Despite this my personal information has been compromised at least 6 times in the last decade, that I know of.
The latest breach came courtesy of the Colorado department of deadbeat dads or whatever they call it. I don't have any children, but if you are a male employed in Colorado your employment and tax records, including SSN are provided to this department in case you might be a deadbeat dad. Their hosting service was breached and all that data was sucked up into the void.
I also plan on one of my credit cards or debit cards getting compromised every year or so. Again, not because I give my info out willy nilly to any any site that asks, but because someone will steal the backup tapes kept by a parking lot at the airport or because someone hacked the local grocery store's POS provider.
These days I keep a permanent lock on my credit with the agencies, use reasonably strong unique passwords for the important things, and make it a habit to check my accounts for any weird activity every few days.
Earlier this year, my worst nightmare came true when someone suddenly sent $4,000 to my Venmo account, which was connected only to a separate savings account. There was no balance until I used Venmo for a transfer with family, so you can imagine my surprise.
Within minutes there was a request from a 3rd party for the money. Let me assure you that I’m not usually involved in money laundering! A few minutes later the original sender of the money messaged to explain her mistake and that the 3rd party was someone who was selling her a car. I returned the money and closed my account.
Everything about modern banking seems darned casual when one grew up with cards being ‘schwacked’, you know?
Setting up an autopay on my hard-earned clean lucre can make my skin crawl. When we first moved into our current house 25 years ago my wife set up the water bill to be paid out of our checking account. NOW I have to be sure there is sufficient funds to cover it lest there be an overdraft. Overdrafts were once one of the scariest things that you could imagine. Well, maybe that was an older generation, eh. Seems like banks make it too easy now for overdrafts.
I've set up a few autopays on my credit card, such as Spotify, as I have no other recourse since they will not take my personal check. At least I can still use checks for power, gas and trash service. For now. With online banking does anybody still keep their checking balance manually?
"With online banking does anybody still keep their checking balance manually?"
Yes, daily. Instead of any of these stupid applications that wants to sync with your bank for you, I've been using excel spreadsheets to track spending, income, and balances for years and years now. If I want a pie chart, I'll make one myself.
Thank you, James. I have really missed your Trib column, and am so happy you're back. As for the 11 new columnists-a few are interesting-none seem humorous. Plus, a couple months ago Taylors Falls lost its delivery person. I now have to read the paper online. Just not the same. You can't snap the pages open. You can't do Crypto or crosswords w/o printing them. You don't realize how many things you use old newspapers for, bbq chimney briquet starting, for example. Oh well, I'm not a Luddite, so I guess I'll adapt. Tana
One Friday about a month ago, I came home from work to find three messages on my phone. (Yes, landline. You think I give out my cellphone number to anybody?) One was a Caller Unknown with an area code in West Virginia who hung up. The second was from my local bank, also hung up. The third was the bank again, with a young woman asking me to call back.
I had to work on Saturday, and so would be unable to get to the bank until Monday. I went on-line to the bank website to see if my money was still there. I had never signed up for on-line banking. It began asking for account numbers. I backed out. It's not that I don't trust my bank's system. It's that between my computer and the bank's computer there are a whole bunch of wire and tubes and who knows who may be listening in.
(Turned out someone in WV had both my account number *and* my SSN, and was trying to cash a check. Unfortunately for them, my account had insufficient funds. I told Equifax and the rest not to approve any loans in my name, and I changed all my passwords to "the name of the song you invented with your friend Mike to sing the praises of the 1974 Cubs.")
You showed admirable restraint, using the word "lucre" without the almost obligatory "filthy" in front of it...
That's well on the road to becoming a portmanteau word - "filthylucre"
The few times that I've experienced anything close to bank hacking has been with credit cards - and always either while I was preparing to leave on a vacation, or while I was on a vacation.
We were preparing to head to Hawaii in 1998 when I received a notification of suspicious activity on my mastercard - "Did you make two $500 purchases as some intelligible website in Wyoming, an hour apart?" Ah, nope. "Great, we'll just cancel your card and mail you a replacement..." I'm leaving for Hawaii at 6AM tomorrow morning, and all of my reservations are held on that card. "OK... well, you should be okay. Can we mail the replacement card to your hotel in Hawaii?" How long might that take? "We will send it FedEX, it should be there in 2 days." So I figured that the card would either get to Hawaii before I arrived, or would be delivered in Hawaii after I had already left. - It did, in fact arrive in two days.
More recently while I was in Phoenix AZ for my Goddaughter's wedding in 2023, my credit card company sent a message through the card app, a txt message, and a phone call to my cell to ask if I had just ordered $190 worth of Pizza in Fresno. No, I'm currently in Arizona. "Perhpas family used the card to order pizza while you're in Arizona?" - Ah, no, I live three hours away from Fresno in the Sierra Nevada foothills, and no one has this card besides me, and it is here in my wallet. As the call went on "Did you just order another $147 worth of pizza from a different restaurant in Fresno?" No, I've been on the phone with you for 12 minutes. "OK, we'll cancel your card and mail a replacement." Eh, I'm paying for this hotel/resort with the card we're discussing - is it possible to use the card when I check out in a day? "No, I just cancelled that card." - I used another card I had with me, but gads, the timing. I guess at least they were proactive about the potential fruad.
Chase Bank appears to be in the final stages of hysteria regarding their need to know my family income.
Again, James makes me LOL. Especially: "DAD JUST TEXT IT PLEASE" lololololol because I am very much the same way about this stuff.
If I remember correctly, the full Depression barrel ensemble was the barrel, the two suspenders (nailed inexpertly to the outside of the barrel), shoes with the sole flapping *plus spats* (very important), a derby hat, white gloves, and a cigar butt being daintily held with a toothpick.
Classic Lileks, pure gold.
Thanks for the frown turned upside down, and bonus guffaws.
I needed that.
* relaxed sigh *
As someone in tech support, we advise the following rule for password creation: "Your password must be between 732 and 942 characters. It cannot be the same as any word in any known language. It must include 3 heiroglyphs, ancient Babylonian text and the solution to Fermat's last theorem." However, the solution to Fermat's last theorem has recently been posted online, so we are in the process of changing that requirement.
As far as I can tell I've never been 'hacked' or given away my personal information as a result of a phishing or mishing attack. Despite this my personal information has been compromised at least 6 times in the last decade, that I know of.
The latest breach came courtesy of the Colorado department of deadbeat dads or whatever they call it. I don't have any children, but if you are a male employed in Colorado your employment and tax records, including SSN are provided to this department in case you might be a deadbeat dad. Their hosting service was breached and all that data was sucked up into the void.
I also plan on one of my credit cards or debit cards getting compromised every year or so. Again, not because I give my info out willy nilly to any any site that asks, but because someone will steal the backup tapes kept by a parking lot at the airport or because someone hacked the local grocery store's POS provider.
These days I keep a permanent lock on my credit with the agencies, use reasonably strong unique passwords for the important things, and make it a habit to check my accounts for any weird activity every few days.
Passwords, bitte!!!
Earlier this year, my worst nightmare came true when someone suddenly sent $4,000 to my Venmo account, which was connected only to a separate savings account. There was no balance until I used Venmo for a transfer with family, so you can imagine my surprise.
Within minutes there was a request from a 3rd party for the money. Let me assure you that I’m not usually involved in money laundering! A few minutes later the original sender of the money messaged to explain her mistake and that the 3rd party was someone who was selling her a car. I returned the money and closed my account.
Everything about modern banking seems darned casual when one grew up with cards being ‘schwacked’, you know?
This is creepy — James has the same bank pw as me!
Setting up an autopay on my hard-earned clean lucre can make my skin crawl. When we first moved into our current house 25 years ago my wife set up the water bill to be paid out of our checking account. NOW I have to be sure there is sufficient funds to cover it lest there be an overdraft. Overdrafts were once one of the scariest things that you could imagine. Well, maybe that was an older generation, eh. Seems like banks make it too easy now for overdrafts.
I've set up a few autopays on my credit card, such as Spotify, as I have no other recourse since they will not take my personal check. At least I can still use checks for power, gas and trash service. For now. With online banking does anybody still keep their checking balance manually?
"With online banking does anybody still keep their checking balance manually?"
Yes, daily. Instead of any of these stupid applications that wants to sync with your bank for you, I've been using excel spreadsheets to track spending, income, and balances for years and years now. If I want a pie chart, I'll make one myself.
"With online banking does anybody still keep their checking balance manually?"
No. On the other hand, it usually didn't balanced anyway, back in the day.
Thank you, James. I have really missed your Trib column, and am so happy you're back. As for the 11 new columnists-a few are interesting-none seem humorous. Plus, a couple months ago Taylors Falls lost its delivery person. I now have to read the paper online. Just not the same. You can't snap the pages open. You can't do Crypto or crosswords w/o printing them. You don't realize how many things you use old newspapers for, bbq chimney briquet starting, for example. Oh well, I'm not a Luddite, so I guess I'll adapt. Tana
Financial paranoia is a GOOD thing! I need more of it.