Can't the account information on my checks be easily used for fraud?
Yes, and there are almost no checks (no pun intended) on people pulling money from your account using a routing number. It is an EXTREMELY insecure system. If you want a real Halloween scare, read this article: Easy Check Fraud Technique Draws Scrutiny. Unfortunately you just have to live with it. If you are curious why this loophole is allowed to continue, consider how hard it is to close it without undermining the convenience of checks. Short of you going to the bank with each person you write a check to and showing ID to validate the transaction, I don't see how you could continue to use a negotiable instrument like this without such a security hole.  The ultimate answer is going to have to be replacing checks with other means of payment. Yes, those numbers are all that is needed to withdraw funds, or at least set online payment of bills which you don't owe. Donald Knuth also faced this problem, leading him to cease sending checks as payment for finding errors in his writings. The bottom line is to keep most of your money in accounts with no check privileges and to not give the account numbers for these accounts to anyone. Keep just enough in your checking account for the checks you are going to write. "That's accurate.  Here is another risk with the current checking system, which many people are not aware of: Anyone who knows your checking account number can learn what your balance in that account is.  (This is bank-specific, but it is possible at the major banks I've checked.) How does that work?  Many banks have a phone line where you can dial up and interact with an automated voice response system, for various customer service tasks.  One of the options is something like ""merchant check verification"".  That option is intended to help a merchant who receives a check to verify whether the person writing the check has enough money in their account for the check to clear.  If you select that option in the phone tree, it will prompt you to enter in the account number on the check and the amount of the check, and then it will respond by telling you either ""there are currently sufficient funds in the account to cash this check"" or ""there are not sufficient funds; this check would bounce"". Here's how you can abuse this system to learn how much someone has in their bank account, if you know their account number.  You call up and check whether they've enough money to cash a $10,000 check (note that you don't actually have to have a check for $10,000 in your hands; you just need to know the account number).  If the system says ""nope, it'd bounce"", then you call again and try $5,000.  If the system says ""yup, sufficient funds for a $5,000 check"", then you try $7,500.  If it says ""nope, not enough for that"", you try $6,250.  Etcetera.  At each step, you narrow the range of possible account balances by a factor of two.  Consequently, after about a dozen or so steps, you will likely know their balance to within a few dollars.  (Computer scientists know this procedure by the name ""binary search"".  The rest of us may recognize it as akin to a game of ""20 questions"".) If this bothers you, you may be able to protect your self by calling up your bank and asking them how to prevent it.  When I talked to my bank (Bank of America), they told me they could put a fraud alert flag on your account, which would disable the merchant check verification service for my account.  It does mean that I have to provide a 3-digit PIN any time I phone up my bank, but that's fine with me. I realize many folks may terribly not be concerned about revealing their bank account balance, so in the grand scheme of things, this risk may be relatively minor.  However, I thought I'd document it here for others to be aware of." When an someone as esteemed and smart as Donald Knuth tells you the chequing system is busted it's time to close your cheque account, or I guess live with the associated risk. Answer to question, yes your account information can be used to commit fraud on you via your bank. I was a victim of this.  I'm not sure who got my routing and account number off my check, but someone subscribed to Playboy.com using my bank account information.  Luckily it was only for about $30 and the bank refunded my money.  However, it was a mess in that I had to open a new checking account and keep the other one open until all checks cleared.  The bank was extremely helpful and monitored the account to make sure only the checks I told them about were processed.  I then had to close the old account. This is why I believe checks are much less secure than credit cards or debit cards.  A paper check can lay on someone's desk for anyone to pick up or write the information down off of it.  I avoid checks if at all possible.  For things like Craig's list, I would try to use PayPal or some other intermediate processing service. Yes this is a huge security loophole and many banks will do nothing to refund if you are scammed.  For example for business accounts some Wells Fargo branches say you must notify within 24 hours of any check withdrawal or the loss is yours.  Basically banks don't care - they are a monopoly system and you are stuck with them.  When the losses and complaints get too great they will eventually implement the European system of electronic transfers - but the banks don't want to be bothered with that expense yet.   Sure you can use paypal - another overpriced monopoly - or much better try Dwolla or bitcoin.
I have won a large amount of money on an online casino. How reputed is the company? Have you done any research around it? It has taken 2 months for me to see any payouts. Last week I received $2300 check from them.  Did you win everything in the same period? If so there is no reason why they sent you a smaller check of $2300 instead of the full amount. This should raise a red flag. Why would someone write multiple checks. The only valid reason is you won in different months. The payout for first month was $2300 and they sent a check. The payout for next month is large amount ... the request for Bank Details. that they would rather wire me the money and they are asking for my banking account number and routing number. Although giving bank account number and routing has some risks. This is the fundamental information that is need to make a credit to your account directly. You would be giving this to quite a few entities / people. In most countries, this information is printed on every check that you write from your account. Is this safe? Or am I stupid for even considering this? Online world is full of traps and this could be a scam. So proceed with extreme caution. Insist of check. In worst case open a different savings account, that does not allow direct debits, does not have over draft, etc. Use this to receive money and move it into your regular account. One reason why they limit it is to protect you. If I hack your account, I get your entire financial history. I can see a copy of every check you ever wrote. I can see the account number with every doctor, utility, and credit card. I can also see the account information on the back of those checks for all your relatives who you sent $10 for their birthday.  I can use the information in those accounts to see where you used to live, this allows me to spoof you when applying for new credit. If they ask if I ever lived on Main street in Anytown USA. I can confidently say yes. If I only let you download a window of time, the responsibility is on you to protect that data that is before the window. They protect it in file isolated from the internet, and finally only in archive locations. Some of the information doesn't exists in electronic form. Data from the 1990's and earlier may not exist in the form you want. They have been expanding the windows over time. I can see/download a pdf of my monthly statement going back 7 years. Of course that data can't go directly into quicken. Some places do let you get a file that goes back farther, but they charge you for it, and it can only be done by them sending you the file. That prevents you from downloading your entire  history everyday. That times 70 Million customers would overwhelm their server and other infrastructure. Regarding the amount of data: "As others have noted, US law says that if you have over half the bill, it's worth the full value, under half is worth nothing. I presume if it is very close to half, if even careful measurements show that you have 50.5%, you'll have difficulty cashing it in, precisely because the government and the banking system aren't going to allow themselves to be easily fooled by someone cutting bills in half and then trying to redeem both halves. I've seen several comments on here about how you'd explain to the bank how so many bills were cut in half. What if you just told them the truth? Not the part about killing someone, of course, but tell them that you made a deal, neither of you wanted to bother with complex contracts and having to go to court if the other side didn't pay up, so your buddy cut all the bills in half, etc. As you now have both halves and they clearly have the same serial number, this no real evidence of fraud. Okay, this is technically illegal -- 18 US Code Section 333, ""Whoever mutilates, CUTS, defaces, disfigures, or perforates, or unites or cements together, or does any other thing to any bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt issued by any national banking association, or Federal Reserve bank, or the Federal Reserve System, with intent to render such bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt unfit to be reissued, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both."" But you didn't do it, the other guy did. I presume the point of this law is to say that you can't get a hold of currency belonging to someone else and mutilate it so as to make it worthless. As he's now given you both halves, I doubt anyone would bother to track him down and prosecute him. Just BTW, while checking up on the details of the law, I stumbled across 18 USC 336, which says that it's illegal to write a check for less than $1, with penalties of 6 months in prison. I just got a check from AT&T for 15 cents for one of those class action suits where the lawyers get $100 million and the victims get 15 cents each. Apparently that was illegal." I personally use mint.com and find the alerting feature to be handy.  The reports and ledger are nice for a web page and attractive, but I use Quicken for really keeping track of my money and budget.  Mint.com just doesn't offer the depth I want; but a lack of depth is a feature for some people. The one thing I do is to check my accounts online every couple of days (not just via mint's interface).  I am still protected from fraud if someone steals my money regardless of the vector of attack.  So mint's fault or not, I have to keep on top of my outgoing and incoming transactions with frequency so I can stop problems before they get too deep. summary:  the security is important, but being secure or not doesn't absolve me of being aware of all the transactions on my account.  I will still be protected by consumer laws (as much protection as that is) but I can't expect mint to fix any problems it might cause. What? My last room mate was a teller, and I can tell you this isn't the case. If you're given a bad payroll cheque or a bounced cheque the bank will know before its transferred. If payroll bounces find a new job because you're fucked.   If you're working for a company that makes over 1 million a year, they can issue paper cheques but choose not too for whatever reason. can I be prosecuted for fraud as well? Yes. It is possible in several jurisdictions (e.g. UK). You have (unwittingly) cooperated with the fraudster and arguably been at least an involved party or accessory to a crime or attempted crime.  Whether you are actually prosecuted depends on whether the fraud or attempted fraud is reported or detected, whether the prosecutors obtain evidence you knew (or should reasonably have known) that there was some criminal aspect to the events and, at least partly, on your actions once you became aware of the fraud. However I am not a lawyer and law varies from place to place considerably. According to Online Threat Alerts If someone asks you to lend him/her your bank account, debit card and PIN number for a fee, or offer to transfer money to your bank account, ask you to transfer a certain amount to another account, and then asks you to keep the rest as payment, please do not take part in such activity. This type of activity is a money laundering scam, used by criminals to trick people into unknowingly taking part in a crime that can land them in jail. I wouldn't worry too much, you have been extremely naive, foolish and negligent but what matters is how you behave now (probably). If you have the expired check in hand and take it back to the bank that issued it to you, I'd think they could do something for you.  (I'd hope they would, anyway.) But automatically?  I don't think so. "They close accounts to render them inoperative.  They never delete accounts because they want to retain the data to inform any future decision to give you credit.     Also, 99% of the time, if a customer demands their account be deleted, it's because of adverse credit marks and the angry customer wants this accurate information to stop burning their credit report. The answer in this case absolutely must be ""heck, no!""  That pretty much precludes any valid reason to delete an account.  As such, their business systems are not built in a way to make account deletion really possible. Even if you got a job with the company's data-processing department and had direct query/write accesses to the databases, you would find it technically inachievable to surgically remove the specific data (without risking serious damage to the entire DB).  And it would still be in transaction logs, so not gone forever.   Another reason to keep your account alive is to give you online access to statements.  After all, the IRS can audit you 5 years after the fact, so it's real nice to be able to go back that far.  Most places the statue of limitations is 6-7 years, so again, defending yourself in a lawsuit, here's raw data from an independent third party that you couldn't have faked.  Strictly from a customer service POV, that means you can self-serve on requests like that, instead of having to involve expensive staff time.     I totally get the annoyance of having yet another login/password you don't want to have flapping out there in the breeze potentially exposed to a cracker... but given that the account is closed, it's probably not going to cause you much trouble.  If anything, change the password to one outside your normal choices, perhaps even one you don't know (retain). As long as you retain the email you have tied to the account, you can always reset the password on the off chance you ever need to get back in.   Speaking of that, don't rely on your ISP's (me@rr.net or me@att.net or me@xfinity.com), get a Gmail account. I have a dedicated gmail account just for stuff like that."