Interac e-Transfers
Interac® e-Transfers are the fastest and safest way to send and receive money.
With Interac® e-Transfers, you can send money in minutes to anyone with an email address or mobile phone number and an account at a Canadian credit union or bank. The process is simple, convenient and secure. It's a great alternative to cheques and cash.
There are two ways to use Interac® e-Transfers:
- You can send money to anyone in Canada
- You can request money from anyone in Canada
With Interac® e-Transfers you can:
- Settle a tab with a friend
- Pay your rent
- Pay for items purchased online
- Save time by skipping the ATM
Benefits of e-transfers:
- Send, receive, or request money directly from and to your existing account using online banking
- Removes the need to share personal or financial information, keeping your address and account information private
- A well thought out security question is critical to protect your transfers from being intercepted (discover more about secure questions below)
- You can set up Interac® Autodeposit to skip the security question and instantly accepts the money into your account
- Keep track of all Interac® e-transfers
- Available 24/7, anywhere in Canada
Did you know that you can Send or Request Interac® e-Transfer without any extra fees; now part of your included Standard Transactions. Which means you can enjoy unlimited Interac® e-Transfers on Flex and UltraFlex Spending accounts, and up to 20 on a Core Spending Account for free. Discover more about Spending accounts here.
The importance of a security question.
The core of a successful Interac® e-Transfer relies solely on the strength of the security question- without a strong password the funds could easily be intercepted by anyone. Security questions are put in place to safe-guard your money during an Interac® e-Transfer to ensure that it is being deposited only by the intended recipient.
How secure is your security question?
Interac® e-Transfers are growing in popularity. With close to a million Interac® e-transfers completed each day, it is no surprise that people are not taking the time to properly select a secure security question. Most people don’t realize how easy it could be to intercept an Interac® e-Transfer with questions like:“Who was your favourite Jonas Brother?” or “What month was Fluffy born?”
Questions like these are easily guessed by cyber criminals by leveraging two key features: the allowable four attempts and a quick internet search.
Why would they allow you to make 4 attempts?
The recipient is allowed four attempts to enter the password. This is necessary to allow for the probability of human error- things like typos, improper capitalization or forgetting the new answer.
Looking back at our questions, let’s see how secure they actually are.
“Who was your favourite Jonas Brother?”100% chance of interception. Since there are only three Jonas Brothers, anyone can guess who your favourite is by the third attempt without knowing anything else about you. This even allows one extra attempt to account for a typo. This is leveraging the allowable attempts and possibly an internet search if you have no clue who the Jonas Brothers are.
“What month was Fluffy born?”
33-100% chance of interception. Since there are only 12 months in the year, without knowing anything about Fluffy or you, someone can guess four different months and potentially land on the correct answer. They will get it right 33% of the time without any extra information. If they were more motivated to do a quick internet search and look on your social media and find out when you most post about Fluffy – better yet find a social media post of Fluffy celebrating their birthday, the chances increase to 100% chance of interception.
Tips on security questions.
- Make the question and answer unique and difficult for anyone else to guess
- Communicate the answer to the intended individual in person or on a phone call if necessary (never use email or text message)
- Use a unique question and answer for each recipients
- Never put the answer to the question in the question itself or comment section of the Interac® e-Transfer
- Never make the answer common knowledge
- Never e-mail or text the individual with the answer
- Never make the answer easy to guess
- Never use the same question and answer for all Interac® e-Transfers
Examples of weak security questions and answers:
Q: What month’s rent is this for?A: June
A cybercriminal would likely be able to intercept given that there are only 12 options as the answer and given the date of the transaction
Q: What’s the name of my dog?
A: Rosie
Based off of how much you share about your dog on your public social media pages, this question is easily hacked by doing online research
Q: What colour is the sky?
A: Blue
Common knowledge questions are extremely vulnerable to being intercepted as everyone knows the answer
Remember – it is your responsibility to build a strong security question to ensure that only the intended individual becomes the recipient of the Interac® e-Transfers.
Safest way to transfer money, now even safer.
Running around all day? Have a thousand different passwords to keep track of? Set up Interac® Autodeposit to automatically accept and deposit Interac® e-Transfer funds into your account. Setting up Interac® Autodeposit bypasses the security question and the funds are instantly deposited into your account.
Interac® Autodeposit adds an extra element of protection to ensure you receive all your Interac® e-Transfers, especially if your e-mail account has been compromised. Since every Interac® e-Transfer you are sent is automatically deposited into your account there is no e-mail and security question that can easily be redirected by someone else who has access to your e-mail. All you will receive is the e-mail notification that the funds are now in your account.
For your protection there are limits placed on how much a person can send by Interac® e-Transfer.
| Per Transasction | Send (debits) | $3,000 |
| Receive (credits) | $10,000 | |
| Maximum Amount Per Day | Send (debits) | $10,000 |
| Receive (credits) | $10,000 | |
| Weekly | Send (debits) | $10,000 |
| Receive (credits) | $70,000 | |
| Monthly | Send (debits) | $20,000 |
| Receive (credits) | $300,000 |
Request Money
Request up to $25,000 directly from anyone on your e-transfer recipient list. Once accepted, the funds will be withdrawn and deposited into your account.
® Trademark of INTERAC Inc. Used under license *There may be a non-refundable service fee each time you send an e-Transfer ** Transfer time is dependant on internet and financial institution connectivity
