Biz/Tech--Privacy Report, The Post: "High on Hopes, Low on Trust"
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>>> High on Hopes, Low on Trust
By Leslie Walker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday , September 24, 2000 ; H08
I dove into the research for this article with high hopes: I was going to get the Internet to organize my finances. No longer would I forget to pay bills or misplace the paperwork needed to file my taxes. The Internet would make up for my sins.
I tested all the financial institutions with which I do business to see how easy it would be to monitor my money on the Web. I even tested a few automated advice sites and created all-in-one financial dashboards to see how helpful they might be.
The results were tantalizing, but disappointing. Everything took longer than I expected, and many set-up programs were confusing. Connections timed out, requiring me to reenter my account numbers over and over.
I started this project six months ago, when I set up online access to my Bank of America checking account. I was pleased to have my cash flow readily available from a Web page, although I found I didn't look in on it very often.
Signing up at the bank's Web site was easy, but only after I found the right place. At first I was confused about the difference between the bank's dial-up service, which requires special software and a monthly fee; and the free Web service it calls "online banking." That's what I wanted.
After I found the correct Web site, I entered my account number, ATM number and Social Security number on a Web page that encrypted the data and sent it to the bank's computers. Then I picked an access ID name and password. Bingo, there was my account information.
Over the past few months, I went through the same process with eight other service providers. I visited the Web sites of Vanguard, which handles my company's 401(k) retirement plan; United Airlines, where I collect frequent-flier miles; MBNA Corp. and American Express, my credit card companies; and even Sprint PCS, my cell-phone carrier. All had personal account information waiting for me to access after I entered appropriate identification and picked the passwords I wanted to use for future visits.
The next step was the big one. Did I want to link all my accounts at one site, so I could create a personal "dashboard" where I could see all my balances at once?
First, I visited Yodlee.com (http://www.yodlee.com), a leading vendor of all-in-one financial software being licensed to America Online Inc., Citigroup and many other Web sites. Pleased with Yodlee's site design, I set up all-in-one personal Web pages in many categories, but not finances. Not yet. I wanted to see how it worked.
First I linked my e-mail accounts from Yahoo, Hotmail and America Online so I could see how many new messages I had from a single page. Next, I set up custom news pages to pull headlines from my favorite sources. I even provided my passwords to Amazon.com and eBay.com so I could see my recent online shopping activity.
But when it came to entering my passwords so Yodlee could pull all my financial account information together, I balked. No matter that Yodlee's chief executive had described an impressive security routine that kept people's passwords and user names in separate places with complex protections against hackers.
There have been too many security breaches in surprising places this year, with data exposed online that should have been private. Just last month, a friend of mine had more than $1,000 of fraudulent charges placed on her credit card after someone stole her Net2Phone identification number online. Also last month, a salesman in a big New York electronic store, when I asked if I could buy a product I was holding in my hands on his Web site, told me: "Our site is down for retooling because someone stole our customer's credit-card numbers online."
So I continued to check in on my Yodlee page every so often, but without the financial information it seemed more of a gee-whiz tool than a real convenience.
Then Yahoo debuted an all-in-one account manager from Yodlee's chief competitor, VerticalOne (http://www.verticalone.com), a few weeks ago. I decided to give it a try after the Yahoo director implementing the service described its security precautions that limit who would have access to the data. Yahoo retains control over people's financial data, and does not give VerticalOne access to the data for any marketing use. After years of doing business with Yahoo, I have more trust in it than most Web start-ups.
So I took the first step. I linked my Bank of America account to my Yahoo account. Now I can see a link to my checking account in two places--my regular MyYahoo page and my personal finance page. It's next to the custom stock portfolios I use to track news about companies I cover.
It unnerves me that Yahoo has a record in its database of my checking account history for last month, even though Yahoo assured me the information will remain private. I suppose I may think of Yahoo as a utility on par with my bank and phone company one day, but I'm not there yet.
Nonetheless, I went further last week. I linked my MBNA account so I could track recent credit purchases with a quick click whenever I want. I like this feature, though I am still having trouble remembering the second security key that Yahoo requires you to enter to access financial information. I keep a master password file for all my Web sites in a secret place, and it's annoying to have to look it up.
I am still not ready to link my 401(k) and other financial accounts to Yahoo. If I did link a brokerage account, any stock or mutual fund I bought would automatically flow into Yahoo's portfolio tracker, which would be useful for active traders because it saves having to type in the data. But I'm an investor, not a day trader.
I do not like the idea of any company having access to my private finances unnecessarily, even one I trust.
Until there is a greater payoff---when I actually do more banking from Yahoo, perhaps--or better tools to analyze my asset allocation, the risk of exposure to theft and unwanted scrutiny seems too great. Even for me. And I get paid to understand this stuff.
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