Image: digitimes.ie
From time to time, I might ask close friends and family members for a financial advice, but I can’t say I’ve ever thought about the possibility of “social banking.”
Financial giant, Citibank, is however thinking about the possibility of “social banking,” as least as far as Facebook is concerned. The bank recently posted an interesting message to its Facebook page, asking fans if they would bank through Facebook, testing consumer appetite for “social banking.”
The post has already garnered nearly 800 ‘Likes,’ but comments on the post are overwhelmingly negative – here’s just a small sampling (positive and negative) of my favorites:
- “100%”
- “No way.”
- “Yes, absolutely.”
- “Over my dead body”
- “No. That would just give hackers an incentive to hack Facebook. In the long run, I get my information stolen, and Facebook AND Citibank lose their reputation for keeping your information safe.”
It’s clear, we live in an ever more-connected world. We check-in, hangout, Tweet, ping and snap photos all day and all night. We can already deposit paper checks into our accounts with mobile banking apps and transfer money with a touch.
That convenience has improved the way we do business and streamlined money management, but is a good idea always worth taking to its logical extreme?
Facebook’s questionable privacy history, combined with the obvious security questions raised by many Facebook users in the comments on Citbank’s post, come together to create what could either be a disruptive partnership that changes the way we think about banking, or, it could be a behemoth privacy disaster.
So, what do you think? If you could do your banking on Facebook, would you?
- Marrissa (@marrissam)
