topic Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services in General Credit Topics

Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:15:29 GMT

More cards are using your phone location as added security. They assume if your phone is in a general location of a store, or out of state, and a large transaction is processed near that location, then its probably the cardholder. I recently charged about 2K total at 2 locations within 20 min of each other, no issues, no phone calls or security warning texts.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:19:36 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
More cards are using your phone location as added security. They assume if your phone is in a general location of a store, or out of state, and a large transaction is processed near that location, then its probably the cardholder. I recently charged about 2K total at 2 locations within 20 min of each other, no issues, no phone calls or security warning texts.

What do you mean here. How are issuers tracking phone location? When you use a mobile payment app such as Apple/Samsung/Google Pay (in which case the security is there in other ways)? Pretty sure if I just use a physical credit card, the issuer isn't aware of my phone location unless I want them to be by logging in to their app/site.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Aim_High — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:19:18 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:
More cards are using your phone location as added security. They assume if your phone is in a general location of a store, or out of state, and a large transaction is processed near that location, then its probably the cardholder. I recently charged about 2K total at 2 locations within 20 min of each other, no issues, no phone calls or security warning texts.
What do you mean here. How are issuers tracking phone location? When you use a mobile payment app such as Apple/Samsung/Google Pay (in which case the security is there in other ways)? Pretty sure if I just use a physical credit card, the issuer isn't aware of my phone location unless I want them to be by logging in to their app/site.

It's by the banking app, if you install it and use it. I was asked by Bank of America app if I wanted to enable location services to improve card security and decrease change of fraud declines due to travel. Since I do travel for business, it seemed like an appropriate purpose so I enabled it even though I am privacy-aware and skeptical of those kinds of things. I have heard that a lot of retail store apps are doing the same thing to the extent that they know where you are in the store and if you're lingering in a certain section. Kinda creepy to me to take it that far. Big Brother is watching you.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:19:03 GMT

The card app runs in the background and sends back your location. A card app can have a background process running regardless if the phone app is running or not. For instance, with CO you can no longer set travel notifications and is no longer needed. They verify using your phone as long as the app is installed.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:18:38 GMT

Yes, BoA is the newest on the block to use it. I enabled it as well. I've used CO in Puerto Rico a couple months ago without travel notifications and had no problem making 3 transactions under $100 each within an hour.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:18:24 GMT

I dont even turn my phone on in foreign countries and Amex has no travel notifications and they have never turned down a charge.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

NRB525 — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:18:07 GMT

I kinda doubt there is a sophisticated link between the phone apps, and approval for charges on the card. I checked and nearly all my bank apps are set to only track location while the app is open. The exception Diners, however Diners seems to be most used for airline lounge locator, and I just now opened it to even look at it. Most of the Location data is used in a marketing sense.

Chase has caught some fraud years ago, based on location, but that is after the small charge started through approval and likely has more to do with the fraudsters pattern.

I have also, on rare occasion, gotten a text from one of my banks “is this charge yours?” as I was making some charges on one day. Simple reply “yes it is me” and all was well. But that’s not the phone confirming, that’s me via text.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:17:34 GMT

There is no link for approval, I'm saying that once a charge comes through, it can check your phone to see if you are in the vicinity of the merchant. If so, no security verification is needed. If your phone is at home, then a security verification may trigger.

Keep in mind that when you install a phone app, you may be installing more than one app, and other ancillary app(s) installed may not have a user interface, and run in the background without your knowledge.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

UncleB — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:17:15 GMT

I've moved the discussion on banks using location services to a new thread.

--UB

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

UncleB — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:23:11 GMT

US Bank is now using location data from the mobile app for transaction-level approval decisions as well: https://www.usbank.com/newsroom/news/us-bank-adds-opt-in-location-services-to-mobile-app.html

I can see why some might have privacy concerns, but I don't mind it. If I wanted absolute privacy I would leave the phone at home anyway.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 15:28:26 GMT

I have no privacy concerns unless the government had direct access to it. I'm ok when it is subpoenaed by the government due to crime investigation but not by a private company. I'd have bigger issues if I'm investigated for a crime.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 16:25:21 GMT

My concern (apart from I don't recall I was asked to opt-in, but maybe) is international cell charges abroad. I had no idea that my phone would be sending this data in the background!

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 16:51:01 GMT

I checked the cost ahead of time and turned off app updates unless its using wifi.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 17:45:33 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
I checked the cost ahead of time and turned off app updates unless its using wifi.

It's not app updates so much (as you say, you can turn those off), it is if the app is transmitting location data to US Bank. It's not so much the cost of the (presumably small) amount of data, but some plans, such as Verizon, have a $10 charge for any day when you use data abroad, So an expensive surprise if you think you have controlled your usage to Wifi! (I guess airplane mode all the time, negating any advantage of the location stuff!)

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 17:53:32 GMT

Yeah, its always best to check data rates and expect some data usage when you are out of airplane mode.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 18:18:40 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Yeah, its always best to check data rates and expect some data usage when you are out of airplane mode.

Instead of switching app updates to WiFi only, you can turn cell data off entirely but still retain call/text capability.

I keep my phone's data turned off as a matter of principle (just use WiFi at home) unless I need to use it for something like Waze.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 18:42:33 GMT

Yes, but sometimes I want the data, but not the updates.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 19:16:53 GMT

Nothing new here. Banks and other apps have been tracking our location for ages. In fact, many apps were using Bluetooth to get around system level GPS restrictions. It’s so prevalent that Apple has added a feature to iOS 13 that shows a request for Bluetooth access whenever an app tries to use it so you can choose whether to allow it that time, allow it always, or disallow that app altogether.

I do the same thing with my data as @Anonymous. Turn off cell data and leave WiFi and phone network on. My plan comes with 100MB of data before I get hit with $12/GB and since I’m pretty much always home, it saves me a lot of money using my phone this way.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Drwaz99 — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 21:26:50 GMT

I'm totally okay with this. Google gets my location along with however many other apps and if it cuts down on needless fraud declines/texts, it's worth it in my book.

Re: Banks Using Mobile App Location Services

Aim_High — Sat, 31 Aug 2019 22:10:40 GMT

@NRB525 wrote:
I kinda doubt there is a sophisticated link between the phone apps, and approval for charges on the card. I checked and nearly all my bank apps are set to only track location while the app is open.

The way Bank of America described they would use it was not to verify each individual charge. It was more in a general sense, and not that they would be watching you all day long either They were asking for permission to access location data when the app was not being used. So, about once a day, they ping your general location to cut down on potential fraud alerts.

While that might not cut them all out if they ping you just before you get on an airplane, it would cut down if you lived in Florida but were visiting Seattle for the week for business or pleasure.