Personal Finance Advice and Commentary

Many Americans are making it way too easy for thieves to guess their PINs.

A new survey investigates how account holders feel about their banks’ commitments to privacy protection.

When it comes to online banking and investing, security trumps speed and convenience for nearly 80 percent of consumers. That’s according to a recent Zogby Interactive survey in which 78 percent of 2,160 U.S. adults polled said they’d sacrifice some convenience and provide an extra level of authentication in addition to a password before accessing

Since I last reported on the Citigroup data breach, the bank has admitted that the number of customers affected was around 360,000, about 80 percent more than they originally reported. These types of revelations are now pretty commonplace after data breaches, as firms burned by hackers often prioritize damage control over truthful disclosure. Of course,

Recent data breaches at America’s most secure fortresses, from the U.S. Senate and Lockheed Martin to Citigroup and Google, have sparked renewed corporate interest in “cyberinsurance.” But you may need a hacker to decode these new cyber policies. Insurance Journal reports that a rash of recent headline-making hacks, including the breach of 100 million Sony

Citigroup has released some additional information about the recent attack on its online credit card account management system, but the update sounds a defensive note and leaves many questions unanswered. In a letter to customers posted on its website, Citi said it took “immediate action to rectify the situation,” discovered May 10 during routine monitoring

First Sony, and now Citi. In a statement this week, Citigroup said that some of its credit card customers’ personal data was stolen by hackers, who broke into the company’s online account system. The statement came in response to news reports of a breach that media outlets said occurred last month. The one-paragraph statement, distributed

Citi admitted today that 200,000 customer bank card accounts had been compromised by hackers. From Suzanne Kapner at the Financial Times: The U.S. bank on Wednesday revealed details of the breach, which it said it discovered in early May through routine monitoring, after being questioned by the Financial Times. The bank said that about 1