From small transactions to balance inquiries, Costa Rica banks offer their services by way of “Apps” for smartphones and other mobile devices, like a tablet.
All three state banks, Banco Nacional (BN), Banco de Costa Rica (BCR) and Banco Popular offer their customers apps. Private banks include, BAC, Scotiabank, Citi and BCT.
In addition to Apps, Costa Rica’s banks offer services by way of SMS (Short Messaging Service) that provide banking information and transactions.
Known as “banca movíl” (mobile web), a customer use commands to identify a transaction based on codes define bby the bank to channel the orders.
In the case of BAC the number is 1BAC (1222), the Banco de Costa Rica uses BCRM (2276) and the Banco Nacional, BNCR (2627). Private banks like Scotiabank, Bancredito and Promerica provide services through the Kölbi platform of the Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad (ICE). To use this mobile service, a PIN provided by the bank is required to activate and then to make transaction.
Mobile Banking
Mobile banking has until recently (2010) most often been performed via SMS or the mobile web. Apple’s initial success with iPhone and the rapid growth of phones based on Google’s Android (operating system) have led to increasing use of Apps, applications downloaded to the mobile device.
Advancements in web technologies such as HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript have seen more banks launching mobile web based services to complement native applications.
Whe accessing a bank’s website on a mobile device a number of things can happen on mobile detection such as redirecting to an app store, redirection to a mobile banking specific website or providing a menu of mobile banking options for the user to choose from of which visiting the main homepage is one.
But how secure is mobile banking? Could a thief sniff out your bank account information digitally? Is it safe to make financial transactions using an app or text messaging, or by visiting a mobile Web site?
The good news is that mobile banking is somewhat secure just because there are so many variations of banking apps and methods in the market. A thief has no way of predicting which method a potential victim might use. If there were only one standardized method the story might be different. Even so, there are certain rules you should follow to make sure your banking information remains safe.
Experts say that accessing your bank’s mobile website or using your bank’s mobile application to access your account is much more secure than conducting traditional online banking on your computer.
