Efficient and safe
All it takes to make your online banking as safe as possible and to protect your account from unauthorised access is staying on top of the latest safety alerts and following a few simple rules.
Home > Internet safety
TANs (Transaction Number) can only be used for personal transactions. Your bank will never ask you to enter a TAN for prize draws, security updates or to refund money to your account. Hence, please always use caution if you are asked for your bank details or a TAN when you are not actually making a transaction.
Carefully check your transaction data.
Regularly check your account for transactions.
Set a daily transaction limit for your account.
To block your account, call our emergency security helpline.
Protect your smartphone and computer with up-to-date anti-virus software.
Ignore e-mails asking for personal details.
Do not open e-mail attachments of unknown origin.
Always keep your programs and operating systems up-to-date.
Make your online banking PIN as secure as possible.
Once a TAN has been generated, your chipTAN generator or mobile phone will show all of the main transaction data again alongside the TAN. If these data do not match the data you entered, cancel the transaction and immediately get in touch with your Sparkasse.
Check the transactions on your account regularly. You can do so both online using our Sparkassen app and by checking your statements. When doing so, carefully check all of your outgoings, as this is the most reliable way to identify unauthorised withdrawals in time. Please contact your Sparkasse immediately if you suspect fraud.
Specify a daily limit for your online banking transactions. Doing so will limit the maximum amount of money that can be withdrawn from your account each day using online banking. This is a very easy and practical method to limit the amount of money available each day in a way that suits your needs, and to limit the risk of unauthorised access.
If you ever suspect that something is not quite right with your online banking account: Block your account. To do so, either contact your bank directly or call our emergency security helpline.
An up-to-date anti-virus program and personal firewall is essential for protecting your computer from harm. All conventional operating systems already come with a firewall that will monitor incoming and outgoing connections.
It is important to regularly update your anti-virus program to make sure it is capable of protecting you from the latest virus’ and Trojans. It is also important to regularly scan your entire computer for viruses.
All of the above also applies to smartphones. However, different smartphones might require different security methods. For more information, please contact the relevant manufacturer.
Your Sparkasse will never ask you by e-mail to enter personal details such as your account number, PIN, TAN or credit card details on a website.
That means, always be careful to open e-mails, SMS or MMS that are supposedly from your bank. Only install programs from trustworthy sources.
E-mails and attachments can contain viruses and Trojans and infect your computer and smartphone. For this reason, do not open attachments of unknown origin, treat e-mails with promises in their subject line with caution and delete all e-mails sent by unknown senders.
Always use an up-to-date operating system and web browser. Make sure to install the latest updates and security functions for your browser.
After you have logged into online banking for the first time, you will be asked to change your PIN. Please make sure to make your PIN as secure as possible.
That means staying away from using obvious character combinations such as your first name and birth date. Try using a word that is meaningful to you or easy to remember phrases and their acronyms.
Also, always use a character combination that you are not using anywhere else.