My mother stole my savings, emptied my house, and then bragged via email that she and my sister were going to Hawaii. She expected me to panic. Instead, the bank froze everything… and then my phone lit up with her desperate call begging for help.

The first call was to my bank’s fraud hotline.

“I need you to review the login attempts,” I told the representative firmly. “And I need you to suspend all transfers initiated in the last 72 hours.”

The representative paused while typing.

Ms. Collins, I see several failed login attempts and one blocked data connection attempt. Your account is already restricted due to unusual activity alerts.

Blocked. Good.

Because three months ago, I had transferred the $500,000 —every dollar I had saved over a decade in technology—

to a new high-yield brokerage account, in my name only, and with a physical security key required for transfers.