One of the most useful things about Internet banking is that once you have your account information on your computer, you can export it into financial programs such as Microsoft Money and Quicken, to better manage your various household accounts. This can be particularly useful at tax time, if you export your account details into a tax calculator program such as TurboTax.

However, getting the software and your Internet banking to talk to each other can sometimes be easier said than done. While many banks (especially Internet-only banks) are good about this and offer an easy download link to save your online statements onto your computer, others offer only a very basic Internet banking service.

If your bank doesn’t produce export files, you may have luck with asking your software to access your Internet banking account directly, giving it your username and password (it goes without saying that you shouldn’t give these details to any software you don’t completely trust).

If that still doesn’t work, then don’t worry. Search the web for the name of your bank followed by ‘export software’, and you will often find that someone has produced a free script that you can use to save the information from your bank’s website. These scripts generally work by first asking you to save pages from your Internet banking using your web browser’s Save button or menu option, and then taking the files produced and converting them into a format that your financial software can understand.

If all else fails, call up your bank and ask them to help you. If they refuse, and it is really important to you, you might consider opening an account at an Internet bank, where they will be much more understanding towards these kinds of requests. You might also want to complain to the company that makes the financial software, as they may be able to persuade (or even help) the bank to do something about the problem.

There is no doubt about the fact that identity theft is on the increase. More and more people are losing their identities and money each year due to the efforts of a select few individuals who know how to use the Internet to their advantage. Does that mean; however, that you shouldn’t use online banking at all in order to avoid running the risk?
By knowing how to protect yourself while banking on the Internet you can reduce your risk of identity theft while still taking advantage of the numerous advantages and conveniences.

It is important to understand that financial institutions take every available effort to keep the transactions of their customers safe and secure. After all, they wouldn’t be in business for very long if they didn’t. Of course, it would seem that crooks and criminals get more and more creative every year in order to circumvent those security efforts. Just a few of the techniques they use include keystroke collection and phishing activities.

Phishing involves the use of trick emails and even some websites to collect personal information from individuals such as bank account numbers, credit card numbers, passwords, etc. With this information, criminals can then steal your money. So, it is incredibly important to be sure that whatever site you enter such information into or whoever you share such information with is secure and legitimate. In some cases phishing emails can look quite legitimate, as if they are indeed coming from your bank. Before responding such an email it’s a good idea to always contact your financial institution to verify they actually sent the email. If they can’t confirm it, don’t respond and certainly do not share any sensitive information.

Other techniques you can use to protect yourself while banking online is to use passwords that are extremely secure. The safest passwords should be at least six characters long and include both numbers and letters. Never duplicate passwords and try not to use numbers and letters that would be easy to figure out, such as numbers from important dates like birthdays, anniversaries, etc. or names of your children, pets, etc. Usernames should be likewise secure.

Keystroke collector programs work to collect important information such as passwords and usernames that can then be used by a criminal to hack into your online bank account information. To protect yourself from this threat, it is important to check your computer on a regular basis to make sure you do not have any spyware, such as a keystroke collector, installed on your system. This type of program can be installed on your system without you even knowing it and many people are often surprised to find out the amount of spyware that is on their system without their knowledge. Spyware can be detected and removed with spyware blockers.

Finally, don’t forget to store all of your banking information in a very secure location. Never keep the passwords and usernames on your computer itself or even near it for that matter. If you forget your own password or username it’s a lot easier to change it than to worry about losing your money to a computer hacker.

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