[FRIAM] Pardon the interuption, for questions about banking apps

[Steve Smith]

On 9/30/22 9:01 AM, glen wrote:
> But the real question is: Why are you using BofA? I mean, loads of 
> passive investing rent-seekers will *thank* you for allowing them to 
> suck money from you into their accounts (2.87% dividends for BAC!). 
> Why not use something more local?

Any thoughts/insight/advice on going even further than a "local 
bank"?    I dove in with Los Alamos National Bank when I moved there 
because it seemed to be the epitome of "local".   I had two mortgages 
there which never got sold off to a national (even though they were FHA 
and had that clause).  When I cashed out of LANL I put some of my 
ill-gotten gains into shares in the bank. Even Bank Officers seemed to 
think that was a bad investment.   I did it anyway...  It didn't earn 
(not rent-seekey enough?) but it was no worse than leaving it sitting in 
one of their savings accounts, but maybe worse than a T-bill?

During my last mortgage, they had a big outside investor buy in and 
mortgages started getting sold off, then the whole thing got sold to a 
national (Enterprise).  For the most part, things haven't changed that 
much, *but* I know that some guy dressed and looking exactly like the 
Monopoly Bankster is rubbing his hands and cackling over my tiny 
fraction of a drop in his fat-pockets bucket.  Because he knows that 
"profit by a thousand pennies" works, even though I rarely follow the 
inverse with Franklin's saved/earned aphorism.

<virtue signal>

    When I finally payed off my final mortgage last year, I got the idea
    that given the low mortgage rates I could re-up with another 30 and
    pay it down monthly (even on an accelerated schedule) from a fund I
    set up for the purpose, gather tax advantages (haven't had those in
    a while with a low mortgage and a raised standard deduction) and
    make a profit off of uncle sam or papi FED or everyone else on the
    planet I wasn't already gouging.   "Rent Seeking" by another name,
    "taking advantage" by an old fashioned one, "doing what everyone
    else does and the system expects of you" by standard parlance, and
    "smart business" to quote DT.

    So I went to my Credit Union where I hadn't held more than a token
    amount for decades (mainly cuz they didn't offer mortgages and their
    customer service was mildly clunky)...   they were happy to give me
    a fully competitive ReFi, just fill out the paperwork!   Somewhere
    in that process I twigged to just how usurious the whole
    gamesmanship was/would-be.  I mean I knew it all along, I just
    followed the "everyone does it" clause above to help ignore it.  Of
    course my spectrum of friends includes people who live virtually
    hand-to-mouth (month to month) and I know *they* don't do it, cuz
    they aint' got nothin' to do it *with*!  Long story short, I
    declined to refinance and (ab)use the homeowner-incentives of the
    'Gov (that I sometimes love to hate on) to arbitrage my blood money.

    On the backlash to that I then went looking around for local
    investment opportunities and found a few local institutions/funds
    that give loans to small, entrepreneurial activities, small-farmers
    in particular.   I'm still looking askance at them as a possible way
    to lower my guilt over the blood money I normally call retirement
    savings that is out there doing my "rent seeking" for me.   I could
    maybe dodecatuple down on the pre-paid CSA with a small organic farm
    I try to support (and depend on for healthy food) and buy them a new
    greenhouse or another 500sq ft of PV to run the fans and well pump
    when the acequia isn't running, and take it back in bumper crop
    (last year they dumped their end-of-season excess my way on several
    crops and I shared and canned and dried and froze) year after year.

</virtue signal>

So, as I pump my tiny fist at the TV (in encouragement) every time 
Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders or Katie Porter takes some Bankster 
or Oilster or Amazonster or SpaceMogulster to task, I wonder at why I 
haven't moved my ill-gotten gains to the Credit Union?   And why aren't 
credit unions (more) competitive with big fat banks?  I mean in *my 
mind*?  Or am I just too damned lazy to do the research or do the 
transfers and get used to a new "schtick"?

Thanks to Gil and Glen for the reminder that *I* have (yet another) 
tangled bit of karma to tease at here.   Geeze, I think I'll just order 
another widget from Amazon, try to avert my attention.

Carry On,

- SaviorComplexster


> On 9/30/22 07:34, Gillian Densmore wrote:
>> Mmm BofA  for good or ill isdropping brick and mortar banks entirely. 
>> You can't even do much without finger print id.  On me and my rides 
>> sides of things going to any bank, even BofA isn't naturally within 
>> our paths (insert humours pun about traveling salesman and having to 
>> sale around...ok so that was a stretch)
>> I would hope that banks encrypt traffic. but then again...they were 
>> prone oddly specific, deep  things like intercepting traffic by 
>> there...computer monitors. As far as I know that's been patched into 
>> the age of the dodo's
>> I thought because banks use p2p and blockchains for connections that 
>> (in theory) provided they have a oops fat finger that'd be slightly 
>> less risk than when a human is in the loop (security wise). Human 
>> can  remember user passwords, but if a computer is asked to store 
>> those in a encrypted DB, not a chance short of a massive attack 
>> that's problem
>> But you say the week area is on your cellophane? I have no idea how 
>> that works, but it's not surprising.
>> I think fam (ie Mum)  is more concerned about basic user experience. 
>> rather than deep AF schenigans.  LoL I love my mom, but I made the 
>> mistake of pointing out that as long as groups like anonymous, 
>> poodlesec etc around...don't put something on the internet where 
>> you'd be super screwed...but theire's....
>> She heard: two parts: Don't put. and screwed. LoL, man I just meant 
>> that their'd be a spectrum. Me, you(Glen) fam, and i'd guess short of 
>> folks on the list in redicously deep goverment orgs  or coded NDA, 
>> super dooper euphamism speach tricks. Just not that important. ie 
>> unless your pretty public target? not a chance.  But then I also got 
>> curius, how exactly do these banking apps do deposits by check. What 
>> common things go wrong? is security between me and the banks good 'nuf?
>>
>> On Fri, Sep 30, 2022 at 8:15 AM glen <gepropella at gmail.com 
>> <mailto:gepropella at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>>     Well, I'd recommend against doing any banking on your phone, or 
>> doing anything important with it. But if you must, do it on an 
>> exclusive device that doesn't automatically send everything to Google 
>> or Apple, doesn't automatically connect to every coffee shop wifi, 
>> etc. Make sure the whole phone is encrypted. Don't carry it 
>> everywhere *or* have 2 that are cloned so when a skateboarder whips 
>> by and grabs it out of your hand, you can run home and lock 
>> everything down with the clone. Use another phone for arbitrary plebe 
>> things like selfies and Telegram. Use aliases. If they don't know 
>> your real name, they can't steal your ID.
>>
>>     Or, just don't do anything important on your phone. If it's 
>> important, there are other, better, ways to do it.
>>
>>     On 9/29/22 17:07, Gillian Densmore wrote:
>>      > I just recently got more of a proper bank account with BofA 
>> after a 'misshap'  with a cashcard. Keeping it relevant to Friam I 
>> think family has some umm mmm concerns about data security, and...ok 
>> so what they really would like to know for using the apps to make 
>> deposits by check. is How likely is it for things to go sideways and 
>> suddenly deets from the check, everyone that might cares knows.  I 
>> suggested to them: we aren't /that / important. someone like 
>> Poodlesec, or lolPHPsec isn't going to find me interesting enough to 
>> bother. If or when they turn a places electric security into the 
>> consistency of /dev/null or worse. We're so screwed by then anyway.
>>      > Short of that: what's been folks experience? are 
>> they reasonable secure?  Personally I'd think i'd be more likely to 
>> run into problems from fat fingering something. Than a check going 
>> poof, but that'd still suck.
>>
>
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