Methods for purchases using customer computer

A method for purchasing by a customer using a merchant that offers goods and/or services, wherein a bank authenticates the purchase in association with a customer account and assures payment to the merchant, comprising:

• setting up a customer account with the bank that includes a customer account number, a computer identification code identifying a customer computer, other customer account information and plural authentication parameters which are not enabling to an intercepting party to charge against said customer account;
• communicating between the customer computer used by a customer user and a merchant computer;
• assembling order information for a customer order using the merchant computer and customer computer during said communicating step, said assembling step including an amount of charges associated with the goods and/or services;
• building a customer order file which contains said amount of charges and customer information needed for the bank to identify the customer account associated with the customer order which is not enabling to an intercepting party to charge against said customer account;
• said communicating and said assembling steps being performed without communicating a customer account number or similar customer account identification via the internet which may be used to make fraudulent charges against the customer account;
• assigning a transaction identifier during said building a customer order file;
• said transaction identifier not being useful for making other transactions against the customer account;
• communicating between the customer computer and bank computer via the internet an indication that the computer user approves said amount of charges associated with the customer order and the computer identification code associated with the customer account;
• authenticating the customer user using the bank computer and the customer computer to verify the authenticity of the customer user as acceptable for conducting transactions against said customer account based on the indication from the computer user and the computer identification code;
• communicating between the bank computer and the merchant computer via the internet with the merchant computer providing the amount of charges associated with the order, the transaction identifier and the customer identification needed for the bank to identify the customer account associated with the customer order which is not enabling to an intercepting party to charge against said customer account;
• assuring payment from the bank computer to said merchant computer via the internet using said transaction identification and without using any customer account number or identifier which can be used to transact business using the customer account.