The use of money transfer apps is on the rise with a majority of the population now seeking a safe way to save their money online and then proceed with electronic, contactless payments instead of carrying cash all the time.
However, a parallel increase in scamming websites and a number of hackers getting hold of user’s personal information leaves us with one major question: Are these mobile payment apps really secure?
Although most of the apps such as Venmo, PayPal and Cash App guarantee the full extent of safety, there are always few limitations that you have to understand.
First of All, Your Safety Is In Your Hands
You can’t expect to not invite trouble when you are being careless yourself. New customers often don’t read the terms and conditions. They are also least educated by identity thefts and issues of using public platforms to access apps and bank accounts. Under these circumstances, it becomes more probable that they will end up with some sort of personal information loss.
However, you can not blame the application’s security layers for such unfortunate events. If you are making them less safe with your behavior then that is something you need to work on personally.
Use Them For Quick, Convenient, and “Personal” Transactions
Whenever you go through a review of, let us say, PayPal or Cash App online, you would notice how there is a considerable emphasis on using these apps for instant transfers between “peers”.
This is because the apps are readily available for download to a mobile phone with the basic purpose of sending or receiving money from friends and family members. They are not designed to facilitate funds exchange with unknown third parties.
This can be better understood by the fact that most of these apps do not host a “transfer cancellation” feature. You can send money to people you already know via email ID, mobile number, or username. If anything goes wrong, there is always an option to request them to send the funds back. This is not possible if you use the apps to move funds to an account that you don’t personally know.
What’s The Take-Home Message?
If you wish to make use of the apps in the best manner possible then begin by understanding that the protection features offered here are not competitive to debit cards or credit cards.
Unlike credit card payments and bank transfers, once you have initiated a wrong transaction with a mobile app, there is not much you can do about it. Your only hope is that the next person is ethical enough to send you back the money which you transferred using the wrong email ID or number.
Payment apps do provide protection against unauthorized transactions but that is almost about it. There is nothing that the authorities can do against other types of frauds even if you choose to link the app to a high-secured credit card service.
Nonetheless, if you have to utilize the payment apps to make online purchases then always choose the one that offers buyer and seller protection. You can review the fraud and privacy policies before downloading the app.
Moreover, never underestimate the power of using a complex password. This is your first line of defense against hackers and scammers. You can top it up with facial recognition for accessing the app and enabling the “find my device” feature so you can always track your phone and erase the data if it gets misplaced.
You Are Not In This Alone!
By all means, do not hesitate to use these mobile payment apps. They are handy, convenient, and quick with online transfers.
In fact, 79% of the US population is already using payment app of one sort or another. The downloads were further boosted in the year of the pandemic with almost 20 million installations made in just a couple of months.
In many ways, these are more secure than carrying cash in your pockets and paying with paper money.
The issues discussed above are common to almost all the users and that is why it had become absolutely important to discuss how the applications can be used in a more useful manner.
You just need to keep in mind a few precautions and safety measures. The rest would be well taken care of by the app’s own security features. Best of Luck!
