📲 Ah, smart phones! Super-convenient, right? Instant access to information, easy contact with your loved ones right across the globe and the added convenience of paying your bills without signing cheques or licking stamps while sitting at a desk. At this point your favourite Greek philosopher, Aristotle, might be whispering in your ear, “Moderation in all things, my dear! Including convenience”.

Because the convenience of doing things more easily can result in some distraction…

If you were walking down a street notorious for pickpockets, you would be on high alert:

• Eyes peeled,
• ears pinned back, and
• belongings hugged close.

So, do you apply that degree of alertness to working with mobile devices and apps? 

We all should, in order to avoid distraction at critical moments. Let’s face it, moments that involve access to your finances are critical, indeed. There are three main areas you can focus on to keep your smart phone life simple and your digital practices “sanitised” for maximum security:

1. General life practices
2. Email
3. Phone apps

Here are a few points relating to each of these:

Let’s start with general life practices:

• Do all administration tasks at home rather than anywhere else, so that you are using your home Wi-Fi connection and are in a safe place.
• Batch your admin tasks and do financial tasks via a device that has a reasonably-sized keyboard to avoid constant typos.
• Practise good password hygiene by using a different, strong password for every website, storing those passwords safely and changing them regularly.

Now, on to email:

Email vigilance is critically important because email addresses are used all the time in financial administration – and they are still being hacked at an alarming rate. If you receive an email that relates to your finances – even if you are expecting it – check the following things carefully:

• Scrutinise every part of the email carefully for typos, incorrect grammar and strange turns of phrase.
• Be wary of any email with a general salutation such as “Dear Client” rather than addressing you by name.
• Hover your mouse over the sender’s email name and address and check that they are consistent with each other, and that the associated web domain is legitimate.
• Hover your mouse over any hyperlink in the email to check the web address to which it directs you. Best practise is to avoid clicking on any link, and rather to navigate independently and directly to the legitimate website via your web browser.
• Use a trusted telephone number (i.e., a number you have on file, NOT a number listed within the email in question) to call and confirm any account and transaction details prior to acting on them.

Finally, smart phone apps:

1. First up, the first rule from ‘General Life Practices’ up above applies 100% to phone apps. Don’t be tempted to carry out any transaction while in a public place – no matter how urgent or compelling an offer appears to be!
2. Secondly, whenever you download a new phone application, look at it carefully in the App Store or Play Store before you go ahead and install it. Check the date it was published (very recent dates are a red flag), the name of the developers (you can cross-check to see if they are legitimate), how many downloads / users it has (preferably thousands) and the number and quality of reviews in which it has been rated by users. Be particularly careful if there appears to be a number of apps with very similar names, or which all appear related to the same business.
3. Finally, regularly review and purge your phone of apps you no longer use regularly.

The most common phone apps used to scam South Africans appear to be Facebook and WhatsApp, and sometimes a combination of the two. We’ll take a look at staying safe on each:

1. Facebook

• Fake Facebook adverts are a very common fraud pathway, so the rule of thumb is to avoid shopping directly from Facebook. Rather than clicking on a link from the advertisement, take note of the business name you see in the ad and go searching for it independently via your web browser.
• If an advert refers you to a Facebook Page only, be suspicious. Legitimate businesses can’t rely solely on social media platforms, they maintain their own websites for control of transactions.
• Beware of new Friend requests, even if you think you know the person making the request. Check your existing Friends list to ensure that this is not a duplicate profile; click through and check when the profile was set up, verify the person’s birthdate if you can and see how many friends the profile already has. If in doubt, don’t accept the request. You can also do your bit of internet safety by reporting suspicious profiles to Facebook.

2. WhatsApp

• Enable two-step verification on your WhatsApp account.
• If dealing with a WhatsApp business account, be alert to the tone of the interactions and avoid sharing personal information that pertains to your financial affairs.
• Consider setting your WhatsApp privacy settings so that you can only be contacted by someone who is already saved in your contact list. While it’s not suitable for everyone, this is a very helpful protection if it works for your lifestyle.