Wire Fraud — How to NOT be a Victim!

Unfortunately, as cashless transactions have become more popular, wire fraud has too….as well as much more sophisticated. Now days, especially with large transactions like purchasing a home, bad guys will hack your email in order to change the wiring instructions.

Best Practices

  • Only send funds to parties you know.
  • Turn OFF near field communications (NFC) on your cell phone. Only turn it on when you specifically want to use it for making a transaction or transfer data phone-to-phone. Do NOT leave it on, especially when you cannot see the screen. Not only will this help with battery life, but it can help prevent acts in public locations.
  • If this is a large wire transfer, pick up the phone and call them directly (not using information they provided, but what you looked up on your own). Verify the instructions with a human being.
  • If this is a 1st time transaction, send a test amount (not an even $1.00), and call the person directly to see if they received it. Once you have it confirmed, make sure they are added to your contacts so you can “select” them in the future. Keep in mind that if a bad actor compromised your computer, he may have changed the saved contact information in your computer/phone.
  • Have firewall and antivirus applications installed on ALL devices that perform financial transactions — including your cell phone.
  • Question emergency or rushed needs for funds. Make sure your friend or family members really are in trouble before you send.
  • Verify in triplicate ANY international funds request.

Allstate has an excellent resource that can help you understand the reality of wire fraud today. What is Wire Fraud? Examples & How to Prevent Them | Allstate

If you have experienced identity theft and know your data is on the dark web, you need to think about locking down your credit and using services like “Life Lock”.

Cell Phone — Organizing Screens

Do you have way too many icons on your phone screens? They can easily be organized. Here are some best practices and tips:

  • You can have more than one “home” screen. Most people should NOT have more than 3. Most phone models will create a new/additional screen simply by clicking on an existing icon, hold onto that click and drag it/move it to your home screen, now drag it to the right off the screen. This will generate a new or blank screen to drop the icon. If you have more than one screen, this is how you move icons to different screens.
  • Do not put EVERY icon on a home screen. If you only use something once in a great while, it doesn’t need to be on a home screen. Most models, when you swipe upwards OR hit a dedicated button at the button will open a list of everything install organized alphabetically.
  • The first home page or default page that opens when you unlock your phone should be the items you access all the time. Most phones have 3 to 5 icons at the very bottom that show on all home screens. For most of us these are the phone icon, text message icon, email icon, and/or calendar icon.
  • Icons should be organized into groups of similar apps. For example, my default home screen is frequent stuff, my 2nd home screen is work or business stuff, and my 3rd home screen is personal stuff.
  • On a home screen, a single icon can be a folder with multiple icons grouped together. This, for example, is the default configuration of Google apps. I personally don’t like having all my Google apps in one spot. Most of us want to pull out a couple of the frequently used ones and put them directly on the home screen (i.e., not within a folder).
  • To create a folder icon, just drag one icon on top of another. When you let go, a folder icon will appear with both icons inside. Drag additional icons on top of the folder to add them to the folder. To move an icon out of the folder, you open the folder, then drag just the one icon out of the folder. Clicking on the folder icon name allows you to change it or add one if the phone did not automatically generate a name.
  • If I don’t have enough icons to justify having a home page just for something like work stuff. I might make a folder called work and move all the work related apps inside it.
  • You do not need to fill all the spaces on a screen. Leaving some “white space” allows your eye to more easily see the relationships of stuff. This makes it much easier to find an icon.
  • Install an app that functions like a File Explorer on Windows or the Finder feature on a Mac.
  • Files and websites can be added to a home screen with an icon. Every model does is differently, so give me a call if you need help figuring out how to do it on your specific phone model.
  • There are LOTS of free apps but know who is your app author and understand nothing is really free even if it doesn’t cost money. For example, most of us do not want to install an app owned and operated by the Chinese government because of privacy concerns. In China, the government basically has unlimited access to company data. Many apps pay for themselves by using your activity and selling it. They protect your identity individually but sell large chucks of user data to 3rd parties. For example, this is why Facebook doesn’t charge you for creating a profile and using the app to socialize with friends and family. They turn around and will sell the data (in bulk and without individual names/identities) to companies looking for information. For example, if I am a boot maker, I want to know what is the average age and sex of people looking up information about boots. They also let companies buy ads for targeted audiences. For example, a realtor will pay for an ad on Facebook to ONLY go to people in within X miles of a certain location and who have a history of interest in homes or apartments. Most of us consider it a fair trade for getting to use the app at no $$$$ charge.

Give me a call and while I most likely need to be in person, I don’t mind helping you use these mini computers effectively that we call “smartphones”.