Want to save more? Ask for a text reminder.

The Wall Street Journal today reported on a study showing that individuals who were reminded by text messages to save increased their savings account balances by 6 percent. The researchers concluded that attentiveness plays a part in savings discipline. Consumers were particularly motivated by reminders of certain personal goals. Those who were offered particular incentives by their banks upped their savings by 16 percent, on average. Negative messages were no help at all.

If you'd like a regular nudge to urge you to save, you may be able to set up electronic reminders through an online personal finance service. Consumer Reports Money Adviser looked at a few online services recently. (Note: Intuit, which now owns Mint, is reported to be shutting down its original online personal finance service, Quicken Online, and moving customers to Mint.) 

You also can easily automate savings by arranging periodic transfers of funds from a checking account to an online savings account. Consumer Reports offers tips for ramping up your savings. And Consumer Reports Money Adviser judges several online banks.–Tobie Stanger

Phishing crime's up nearly 600%. Don't get hooked!

Criminal "phishing" attacks have risen by nearly 600 percent this year, according to a report from the Anti-Phishing Working Group, an association of financial institutions, online retailers, law enforcement, security and research groups that have combined forces to fight Internet crime.

Phishing is typically carried out by e-mail, instant messaging or text messages that appear to be from banks, online retailers or auction sites. Phishers are using increasingly sophisticated techniques to trick people into divulging information, usually by directing them to a fake website that appears nearly identical to the legitimate site. 

Earlier this month, for instance, the FBI announced it had arrested 100 members of an international criminal ring that used e-mails to direct banking customers to phony bank Web sites, where they were asked to provide account log-ins, passwords and other information the crooks then used to raid their bank accounts.  Victims included thousands of customers at U.S. banks, including Wells Fargo and Bank of America, according to the industry trade publication Bank Information Security.

Who would be naïve enough to be tempted by phishers’ bait?  For starters, how about the highly-security-conscious head of the law enforcement agency that just made that 100-cybercriminal bust (which is now being referred to as the “phish fry”)?  In a San Francisco speech announcing the arrests, FBI Director Robert Mueller said that he’d recently received an e-mail purporting to be from his bank asking him to verify some information about his account.  It looked so legitimate that he started to respond, and was only a few clicks away from being hooked when he suddenly realized this was a classic phishing scam.

Latest phishing scam: Mobile text message from bank

Paul Eng, our electronics blogger, recently discovered a new phishing phenomenon: a mobile text message posing as a legitimate communication from his bank. He was sharp enough to know something was phishy, and avoided the potential scam. 

The incident underscores the need for vigilance in all your communications, particularly with merchants, financial institutions, and government agencies. As the holiday shopping season rolls around, it's a good time to review these cautions to prevent identity and data theft, outlined by the Federal Trade Commission. 

Don't be victimized by fine-print thievery

“Free ring tones for your cell phone*” “Special prices on airline travel*” “Get full MSRP for your used car*”

You’ve likely seen or heard such offers in print and on TV, radio, and the Internet. They often come with lots of conditions, either in hard-to-read fine print or uttered by a fast-talking announcer.

While ads can use fine print or its verbal equivalent to elaborate on the details of an offer, major conditions and other gotchas should be made clearly and conspicuously. Companies that leave the devil for the details risk violating various federal and state laws. In judging an ad, regulators and courts look at whether the overall effect is likely to mislead customers acting reasonably under the circumstances and whether that deception materially affects the deal.

There are plenty of examples of companies’ failing that test.

• August 2009. The Federal Department of Transportation reached a consent order with United Airlines in connection with fares posted on the “special deals” section of airline’s Web site. The agency said the ads violated federal rules against unfair or deceptive practices because they used double asterisks and fine print to disclose that additional payments for taxes and fees were required, along with the purchase of round-trip travel. United must pay a must pay a $75,000 civil penalty.

• May 2008. The New York Attorney General announced settlements with four New York car dealers that advertised various offers, disclosing important details in “fine print or untenable disclaimers.” For example, one Suzuki dealer’s radio ad offered consumers a trade-in price of 100 percent of their vehicles’ manufacturer’s suggested retail price, but left it to a fast-spoken disclaimer to reveal that it would deduct 35 cents per mile on the odometer and, for cars more than a year old, impose an unspecified reconditioning charge. The dealers collectively were required to pay $32,500 in fines and clean up their act.

T-mobile's misleading "makeover" pitch

Since late May, T-Mobile has been running an ad campaign that promises to help consumers find a wireless plan with the “best coverage and price—even if it’s not with us.” Online, an image of actress Catherine Zeta-Jones is the centerpiece for the T-Mobile web page that points bargain hunters to BillShrink.com, an independent website that evaluates your calling needs “against every national wireless plan.” From May through the end of July, T-Mobile says about a million consumers have clicked through to do a makeover and provided Billshrink with key information about their individual cell phone usage. 

But we found one problem: BillShrink searches for plans offered by only four national carriers—AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless—which dominate the market with mostly contract plans and some prepaid offerings. So Billshrink doesn’t search “every national wireless plan,” a fact we confirmed with Samir Kothari, Billshrink’s co-founder and vice-president of products. 

Conspicuously missing are four national prepaid carriers—Boost Mobile, Net10, Tracfone, and Virgin Mobile—which together serve some 22 million price-conscious U.S. customers.