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The websites of Britain’s biggest high street banks appear to have poor security measures, leaving their customers vulnerable to fraud, a watchdog has found. After testing the security interfaces of the ten leading online banks, Abbey and Halifax emerged as the most lax at protecting customer accounts, according to Which? Computing. Like Alliance & Leicester, which was rated ‘average’ for security, sister company Abbey failed to immediately log out customers if they browsed another site after using their account. Partly as a result, the former building society’s security suite was ‘poor,’ compounded by an absence of visible protections for customers transferring money, Which? said. HSBC, First Direct and the Halifax also make no on-screen checks when transferring cash online, potentially allowing someone who hijacks the session to enter their own amount. But it was the Halifax where log-in procedures were among the least secure of the ten banks tested, mainly for account access depending on three sets of keystrokes, traceable by malicious software. In contrast, Barclays had the highest level of visible security measures, followed (after First Direct) by Lloyds, both of which thwart keyloggers by asking customers to click icons in drop-down menus. The use of software to generate random passwords each time a customer logs in to their account was also commended, particularly where another protective layer relied on customers entering random letters from a memorable word. The banks which scored poorly in the Which? probe insisted they have extra security measures behind their websites, while another claimed there was no correlation between on-screen defences and their effectiveness. But Which? Computing's editor Sarah Kidner said: “There are surprisingly big differences between big banks’ visible online security systems. “The banks may say it’s the hidden security measures that count, but to have real confidence in an online account, customers need to see security in place." Aug 28, 2009 Email this article Printer friendly page Previous Page
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