From the first days that I ever showed MoneyVoice to anyone, I began hearing the following question from people like my sister, my aunt, my housemate, etc: Why does MoneyVoice require me to import data about my purchases in order to work? It quickly becomes clear why this is necessary: the whole point of the app is to harness the power that comes along with being a verified customer. Your transactions are how we verify that you are a real customer, and that gives your feedback much more power and influence. But for many this raises questions about what data is imported and how the system works, so here are the most common questions that I hear as CEO.
“What data do you get from my financial institution when I sign up?”
Here is all the transaction data that MoneyVoice has ever retrieved from my personal credit card:
As you can see, this data contains the businesses where I have spent money, the amount spent, and the date. That’s all. This is sensitive data from a privacy perspective, because you can learn things about me by reading it. But the fact that I can just publish 100% of the financial data that MoneyVoice has about me on this blog post illustrates that the data we have about users is limited: We do NOT have credit card numbers (or any other info that could be used to initiate a payment, for example). The MoneyVoice system does NOT contain a single account number, routing number, account balance, credit score, bank username, bank password, mailing address, or even a name.
“Can I use MoneyVoice anonymously?”
Yes. When you sign up, you can just use an unrecognizable username and email address instead of using a publicly recognizable username. You will be anonymous to the extent that your username and transactions are anonymous.
“You just said MoneyVoice doesn’t have my bank username and bank password, but I have to type those into your app when I sign up, so how is that possible?”
Yes, you enter this info into our app, but it never touches our servers or database. Instead, this information is being managed by our partner, Plaid. Here’s a diagram of how it works, which is explained below:
1. User creates a MoneyVoice account with a username, email, & password.
2. When user is ready to import transactions, they launch a screen within the MoneyVoice app that is completely controlled by Plaid. User types bank username and password into Plaid’s text fields, and MoneyVoice cannot see what they type.
3. Plaid sends the user’s credentials to the user’s bank, and if they are correct, the bank sends back approval for Plaid to retrieve user data.
4. Plaid generates a new read-only access token and sends it to the MoneyVoice database, where we associate it with the user. This is simply a number like 485453dfb65fb0bcf43c0102ac04b8d2148e797d, but it works like a key.
5. Every day, MoneyVoice sends the user’s “key” to Plaid, and Plaid requests any new transactions from the bank.
6. The bank sends new/updated transaction data to Plaid, who sends it to the MoneyVoice database, which allows us to generate votes for the user.
7. At any time the user can go into their settings and delete the key so no more transactions will be imported.
“Who is Plaid?”
Securely integrating data systems with thousands of banks is very difficult. Plaid is a company that is entirely focused on these sorts of integrations, and they partner with companies like us so that we don’t have to duplicate all of that work ourselves. Plaid works with many of the leading financial technology companies, such as Venmo, TransferWise, RobinHood, Acorns, etc. They have raised well over $50 million in investment from investors including Citibank, Goldman Sachs and American Express. Most major banks have integrated with Plaid because they trust their security infrastructure. We have had a relationship with Plaid since 2015.
I am so excited that financial technology has finally progressed to the point where it is possible to build applications like this! It has never before been this easy for people to do interesting new things like this with their own data, and we are excited to see how we can use this data to empower people and drive positive changes in businesses all over the world.
You can also read our privacy policy and terms of service. Feel free to email info@moneyvoice.com with any additional questions.