Are budgeting apps safe and why?
A budgeting app is an app that allows you to track your spending and income and allows you to set goals on how much spending you want to do. The apps get information from your bank accounts and download your transactions. In a digitalising world, it’s completely normal to wonder if your data is safe…
Mani Dhanoa
A budgeting app is an app that allows you to track your spending and income and allows you to set goals on how much spending you want to do. The apps get information from your bank accounts and download your transactions. In a digitalising world, it’s completely normal to wonder if your data is safe, especially hearing of big companies being hacked. This article will give some basic security tips and also give the rundown on which apps would be best.
Some general safety features
2-factor authentication
This is exactly how it sounds, 2 factors to authenticate you. The first is usually your password, but the second will be a text sent to your phone number or a code generated from an authentication app.
Complex passwords
Use different passwords and make hard-to-guess passwords- this means not using your name in passwords and making sure it has a mix of capital and lowercase letters, special characters and numbers. You can even go as far as using a password generator that will generate and store your passwords for you.
Watch out for phishing scams
Phishing scams attempt to retrieve some important information from you. One of the more popular scams is where someone pretends to be your bank, most commonly via text or email, asking for bank or personal details. A good way to avoid these is to always be careful, and if you see an email from your bank, contact them on a known number to double check.
Don’t click on links
Another way for phishing scams to retrieve information from you is using malware. Scammers can install this onto your devices through links, which can infect your device and allow access to your passwords. So also make sure you have an antivirus installed.
Be careful on public wifi
Public wifi is exactly that, public! So be careful what activities you are doing on these networks, they may not be secure and someone may be watching and intercepting things like secure passwords. If you can, avoid using them altogether.
Big budgeting apps, and their built-in safety features
Mobile apps, especially those working with your personal secure data, have to think about keeping you and your data safe. They can do that by making sure they keep your data safe, and of course, only open for you. We’ve identified some of the big budgeting apps who are focused on exactly this.
Emma
- SSL 256 Bit encryption, a security protocol that banks use
- Biometric security authentication
- FCA regulated
Moneyhub
- FCA regulated
- Doesn’t sell data to third parties hence the subscription fee
- Bank-level authentication means it doesn’t store your passwords
Mydus
- SSL 256 Bit encryption, a security protocol that banks use
- FCA regulated
- Doesn’t sell data to third parties
- Biometric security authentication
Hyperjar
- 256-bit encryption
Mint
- Makes you verify your account periodically
- Only stores the bare minimum data
- Multi-layered hardware and software encryption
Also, an alternative to consider may be Good Budget which doesn’t have the same security features since it does not connect to your bank account.
256-bit encryption
You may be asking what is 256-bit encryption? Well high level answer is that it locks all your data up when transporting or storing to ensure that even if intercepted, it would not be discernible.
And for those who want the technical answer… 256-bit encryption is a data/file encryption technique, that uses a 256-bit key to encrypt and decrypt files of data, and it is used in most modern encryption algorithms.
To summarise, there are many pros of budgeting apps and for the most part, they are very safe, following these tips will significantly reduce your risk of having data stolen. However, if you feel this is still frightening there are many other ways to budget that don’t include giving bank information, such as using a log book or Excel budgeting templates.
We hope this article has been informative and given you an insight into safety and budgeting apps!