Banking by smart speaker arrives, but security issues exist

Big banks and financial companies have started to offer banking through virtual assistants -- Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Siri, and Google's Assistant -- in a way that will allow customers to check their balances, pay bills and, in the near future, send money just with their voice. And with the rapid adoption of Zelle, a bank-to-bank transfer system, it soon could be possible to send money to friends or family instantly with voice commands. But the potential to do such sensitive tasks through a smart speaker raises security concerns. Virtual assistants and smart speakers are still relatively new technologies, and potentially susceptible to being exploited by cyber criminals. Regional banking giant U.S. Bank is the first bank to be on all three services -- Alexa, Siri and Assistant.