Planning a trip cross country. Is online banking safe through WiFi. Is that how you would do it. It seems when researching campgrounds, through reviews, in many campgrounds the Wi Fi is poor, or it cost extra. Most of the campgrounds we're going to stay at are private not national. Also I'm not a fan of going to their office or store to get Wi Fi. Any suggestions would be helpful. Thank you
I hope it's safe, as that is all we do. Have never had any problems in the 10 years we have been banking over the internet.
Look into an aircard from either Verizon or ATT for your internet service. It will cover 70% of the US, especially urban areas and along major routes. However, there are areas of the US where there is no cell service and in turn no data service or there may be spotty cell service and no data service.
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God I hope it is safe. We have been doing our banking online at campgrounds for five years now.
We rely on Norton for our identity protection for online shopping and banking.
Then, of course, there are also the protections that your bank employs. For example, the first time you log in from a new wifi site or a different computer, it will raise a red flag and they will ask for confirmation that you are who you say you are.
Banks will typically terminate your session if you forget and leave your computer connected to them, but without activity. That helps avoid hacking in. You go online, do your banking, and get out. It ain't a chat room.
We have been using on-line banking since we hit the road FT over 5 years ago.
We have auto pay for the couple of bills we have.
We pay any other bills that occur via on-line bill pay.
We have 'alerts' set up on our bank account: purchase with pin, purchase without pin, purchase over set amount, weekly balance, low balance threshold etc. via e-mail/text notification.
I tease GF that I can track where she has been & how much she has spent via 'alerts' (actually it's true!)
We use a Verizon Air Card simply because we have found CG WIFI systems to be lacking in signal strength, slow and inconsistent.
Regardless of how you connect....you are OK as long as website is a 'secure' site https vs just http site.
Seems more chance of 'problems' just using your card somewhere vs using on-line banking.
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It's safe and I've been doing it for more than a decade.
The caveat: if your computer is infected then it's not safe. How do you infect your computer? by clicking on links and running software you don't know, by opening some types of attachments from e-mails; by clicking on links from an e-mail supposedly from your bank/IRS/lawyer/etc. and you click on it instead of typing the bank URL (this is called "phishing" and it is one of the most common way of giving away your password).
And yes, I understand the irony of telling you not to click/run software and giving you some software for you to click and run
ETA: If you are running through FREE/open wifi anything that is not encrypted can be seen by others with the right software. An easy way to know if it is encrypted is if your webpage starts with https:// instead of http://
Never use the same bank password you use for other sites that may not be encrypted.
* This post was
edited 07/01/12 11:29am by chracatoa *
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Your question appears to be: is it safe thru wifi?
Depending on whom you ask, yes, I've been doing it for years. According to some, it's like handing over your password to a stranger. YOU do what you feel comfortable with. But yes, it's safe.
"Poor" wifi doesn't mean it's less safe, just means it's less fast.
on-line banking is safe as long as your financial institutions's website begins with HTTPS:// (secure). we've been doing it for a long, long time with not a single problem.
as for campground wi-fi systems unsatisfield people tend to post their complaints far more than those who are satisfied post their compliments. we spend 5-6 months a year on the road and visit a lot of parks amd campgrounds the majority of them offer no extra charge wi-fi. the overwhelming mnajority of the time i'm able to get a good, usable signal from our campsite using nothing but the built-in antenna on our laptop. on those occasions when the signal isn't that great...usually due to obstructions such as buildings, trees, other RVs...or if the park's network infrastructure is sub-standard...such as a single transmit/receive point or a router sitting on a shelf behind the check-in desk...i raise an externally mounted wi-fi antenna mounted to the winegard TV mast.
expectations are everything. in virtually all cases if you expect the same sort of speed you have at home you are likely to be disappointed. campground wi-fi systems are geared towards e-mail, browsing and similar activities. if you want to stream video like movies, etc. you're not only going to be disappointed but you're likely going to hog much of the available bandwidth slowing everyone's connection. we've been to several campgrounds that have their network configured to automatically slow *your* connection speed to a crawl if it detects a streaming download. early evening and mornings see the heaviest use (in our experience) and connection speeds are likely to be at their slowest.
73,
rich, n9dko www.bananaboatbytes.com
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Ours is very safe. You put in your code, then a password which you change every 3 mo and a password by the bank which changes everytime you log in. We have been in 13 countries and all 50 states with no problems other than we could'nt get $ out in Japan.
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