Bank account security

Geoff1963

We all know about not giving our bank account details to the Nigerian prince ; but sometimes we need to send money to, or receive money from, somewhere that might be suspicious.

If someone opened an account with £1, is there any way that someone else could use those details to get money from them by fraud ; and if not, would that be a good idea for most of us ?
It is surely easy enough to transfer in the £50 you want to pay, or quickly transfer out the £50 you've received ; without the other party having any details of your "proper" accounts, which might be with a different bank.

Advice welcome.

EarthBoy

Geoff1963 wrote: »

but sometimes we need to send money to, or receive money from, somewhere that might be suspicious.

No we don't. You'd be very stupid if you did so.

GingerFurball_2

Are you looking for tips on how to commit fraud?

eskbanker

Geoff1963 wrote: »

If someone opened an account with £1, is there any way that someone else could use those details to get money from them by fraud ; and if not, would that be a good idea for most of us ?
It is surely easy enough to transfer in the £50 you want to pay, or quickly transfer out the £50 you've received ; without the other party having any details of your "proper" accounts, which might be with a different bank.

Advice welcome.

Some sort of intermediary standalone facility could indeed be useful and more secure than using your own bank account.

In fact, I should think a lot of people could benefit from it.

Perhaps someone could set up a company providing such an independent money-transfer facility to all comers for a small charge.

I know, let's call it PayPal, or Western Union, or....

[other payment intermediaries are available]

Geoff1963

What I mean is :
We all have a set of "very trusted" contacts ( friends, relatives, reputable businesses etc. ) but occasionally need to deal with people or businesses who we trust a little less ; though not completely distrust either. I appreciate the Paypal family exists, but some people don't use them, and we also might not want to appear that we are being suspicious of those people.

Some of us might not deal at all with anyone we don't trust 100 %, others might insist on using a secure third party. Your advice is noted, thanks, but I'll ask the question again, in case anyone knows :

If someone opened an account with £1, is there any way that someone else could use those details to get money from them elsewhere by fraud ? Is it very much more difficult to fraudulently get money out of someone, than from a bank account of which the details are known ; like they will be if I post them a cheque ?

For instance, if I put £50 in my account by mobile phone banking, and then withdraw it from an ATM ; if someone managed to skim the card and video my PIN, they would only be able to get money out of my account, in the few minutes while it is next in there. Perhaps i can avoid that, but I don't know what the next fraud horror story will be, I'm just thinking ahead.

Zanderman

Not sure that I understand your question(s).

Your bank accounts have no connection with each other.

If someone has been paid from one and knows that account's details as a result, there is no way they can access any other accounts.

If someone skims your debit card they only have access to the account that card relates to.

EachPenny

Approaching it from a different way, which might answer the OP's question....

If I had to pay someone I didn't trust 100% I would choose to pay them from an account I have which I rarely use and normally only has £1 sitting in it - rather than paying them from the account that normally has £20,000 sitting in it, for example.

I'd do this because the £1 account has fewer transactions so is easier to monitor for fraud, has a smaller amount of money that could be extracted if someone was able to do something fraudulent, and as an added benefit is the only account I hold with that bank so there are no linked accounts to worry about.

However, I don't really think it is too much of a problem, and if it was someone I really felt uncomfortable giving my banking details to I'd follow the advice of eskbanker and use PayPal or similar. If they refused to use any of those options then I'd know they were dodgy (and ask to pay cash)

agrinnall

It's my opinion that you should invest in one of these...

Geoff1963

Half of this forum is about people being ripped off, and the other half is about criticism for being too paranoid. I guess the truth is somewhere in between.

Thanks for the helpful advice. I've acknowledged appropriately.

EachPenny

There are times where a tinfoil hat sounds like a very good idea....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/profiles/5JB0wWR0YY9GncnWqVm6wml/gloria-hunniford-bank-fraud

https://conversation.which.co.uk/money/gloria-hunniford-scam-santander-bank-savings/

For obvious reasons it is doubtful we'll ever know exactly how this scam was enabled, and despite the good CCTV and associations with people who were charged - and widespread publicity - as far as I know the two main people involved in the scam are still being looked for.