4 Crucial Tips to Keep Your Money Safe in 2024

As we head into another new year (where did 2023 go?), now is a great time to discuss strategies for managing your personal finances in 2024. Keeping your money safe should be at the top of your list. Keep reading for some crucial tips to stay ahead of thieves, scammers, and other bad actors in the new year.

1. Tighten up your account logins

The bulk of my childhood was before the internet basically took over modern life, and one of my biggest headaches now, as an adult, is managing so much login information for so many websites. But the solution is not to use the same password for everything! If you're currently doing this, you're putting yourself at a huge risk.

Thankfully, technology can help here too. Some computers and smartphones have biometrics capabilities, meaning they can store your logins and passwords to access with your face or fingerprint. Another option is to use a password manager -- for these, you need only remember a master password to unlock the rest of your strong, unique passwords. It's worth taking the time to research password managers and choose one you can trust.

While you're at it, it's a great time to turn on two-factor authentication (2FA) for your accounts. You'll get a code texted or emailed to you when you sign in, as a further verification of your identity.

2. Use secure websites

Ever notice the little lock icon in the address bar of your web bar? If you see that, it's a sign you're on an encrypted website. This means the data being sent back and forth is scrambled to prevent scammers and bad actors from stealing it. Most reputable websites are encrypted these days.

And this is good news for another internet safety tip that I have espoused before. In the days before widespread encryption, it was a bad idea to do your banking or deal with other important money matters on public wifi. But you can breathe a little easier doing so now, as long as you're using an encrypted site.

3. Don't click on links

2024 is a great year to get ahead of phishing scams, which have become frightfully common. According to data aggregated by Astra, almost 1.2% of all emails sent are malicious -- working out to 3.4 billion phishing emails sent every day.

In case you don't know the term, a phishing scam is when you receive an email or text message requesting your personal information and exhorting you to click the included link to provide it. Perhaps the email looks like one from your bank, and it says that there's a problem with your account. So you click the link, put in your login info, and now the scammers have it. They can steal the money from your account, or use your information to open new accounts.

If you receive an unrequested email or text that claims to be from an entity you do business with, be suspicious. If you think there might be a problem with your credit card or checking account, don't click that link. Go to your bank's website directly, and investigate further from there.

4. Watch your credit score and report

Finally, it's a good idea to stay on top of your credit score and your credit report. You can likely access your credit score via your bank's website or a credit card issuer you have an account with. Ideally, one of them will give you your FICO® Score, as it's the most useful credit score -- it's the one used by 90% of lenders. A VantageScore can still give you a rough idea of where your credit stands, but it assigns different weights to the factors that make a credit score than FICO does.

Credit reports became free and available every week during the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, but they have since become free every week indefinitely! The caveat is that you must go to AnnualCreditReport.com to get them. Checking every week is probably overkill -- but it's a good idea to check a few times during 2024, and if you're on the verge of a big financial move (like getting a mortgage loan to buy a home), check your report for accuracy and to know what a lender will see when you apply.

Knowing how your credit score and credit report are looking can help you get ahead of fraud and identity theft, which is crucial for keeping your money safe in 2024 -- and beyond.

It's a big scary world out there, and loads of shady characters are hoping to scam you out of your hard-earned cash. Lean on the above tips to outsmart them.