Bank of America is urging its customers to practice safe banking—specifically, by not handing over their login credentials to an AI agent. In a customer email titled "Protecting your finances in the AI World," the bank advised recipients to never share their username and password with another individual or a third-party service, "including an AI-enabled tool or agent that offers to act on your behalf."

You can almost feel the exasperation radiating from whoever wrote that message. Even so, as personal AI assistants become more widespread, a growing number of customers are willingly surrendering their logins. Letting an AI assistant have your banking username and password carries real risks: the assistant could take actions with your money without your knowledge, or your bank might interpret the activity as fraud and lock you out of your account. Even worse, a security vulnerability in the AI assistant could cause it to leak your banking credentials, handing financially motivated hackers a way into your account.

This warning lands as banks are still figuring out how AI agents fit into the financial landscape, and are reportedly struggling with unauthorized agents tapping into customers' funds. Bank of America did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the email. Still, the bank's advice is worth taking seriously—because if something goes wrong, the responsibility falls on you. At most banks, account agreements hold customers liable for anyone to whom they give their login. As the email puts it, "If you do share your credentials, keep in mind that you're responsible for activity resulting from that access."