Farmers & Merchants Bank: Where Family is our Foundation

Mobile Banking Misconception

Myth: Mobile/Online banking puts your information at risk.

While identity theft is rapidly expanding and cyber criminal enterprises are hard at work, the concern over becoming a victim of identity theft using online or mobile banking services remains the same–you’re at no more of a risk banking in-branch vs. online. In fact, banks offer strict security measures to ensure your personal information and accounts are safe online. Security steps include multi-factor authentication, which requires the user to enter unique personal information to gain account access, implementation of encryption software and scrambling user information that is sent back to your bank’s server. This scrambling helps prevent identity thieves from tampering with it.

In addition to the bank’s security protocols, there are a few things you can do to decrease your vulnerability.

  • Choose a unique user ID and create a password with numbers, special characters and at least one capitalized letter
  • Access your online/mobile accounts from a secure server or network
  • Don’t use a public wi-fi network
  • Clear your cache so that files and forms aren’t stored

Click here for how-to videos on navigating our mobile or online banking services.