Some Credit Card Fraud Detective Work

[Phil14312]

Ok gang,

Back in early December there were a bunch of unauthorized charges on my Citi Mastercard to the tune of 3K when all was said and done over about 6 days.

I will commend Citi on their great customer service, everything went smoothly I got reimbursed for every charge and mailed a new account number.

Well it happened again. Luckily I think the charges are going to be <$300 this time over the past 3-4 days, but we'll see when they all show up. This time Citi actually blocked some of the charges from going through.

Now, both times I haven't lost my wallet or my card, it has been in my possession the entire time. Someone got the number (waiter at restaurant, internet?), copied it down and made a duplicate card.

Has anyone else gone through a similar process and is there anything I can do in the future to limit my exposure to this?

FWIW I will commend Citi's security team again as they are able to quickly put a block/account alert and notify me and every customer service agent I've talked to has been extremely helpful.

[Muck]

Has anyone else gone through a similar process and is there anything I can do in the future to limit my exposure to this?

I had someone use my CC for a fraudulent purchase on an on-line electronics site. It was by luck that I was checking my balance on-line and noticed it, managed to trace the retailer and warn them before they even sent the item but they were very unhelpful > : ( ...in fact I’m 70% sure they were in on it.

Their site was an open commerce solution, which I could have knocked up in a day. It was bi-lingual English and Romanian :\

Anyway I told them I was leaving it to the police and my CC company. I was reinsured in a day from the CC company then from the vendor in a week.

So short answer there’s nothing you can do to protect the information on your card. That’s why every card provider I know covers you for full liability against this type of fraud. Yes you can follow all the advice about not letting it out of your sight etc but at the end of the day someone can remember it, or a dodgey site can hand it to someone else. That’s just the nature of the system, these flaws are offset by the convenience and paid for though high interest rates.

[tame_deuces]

Yeah, I got my debet card stolen right before I headed out to sea. I found out 6 weeks later.

When I got my new card it happened again, and I simply switched account (within the same bank). I would suspect you can do the same with credit cards.

[Muck]

Yeah, I got my debet card stolen right before I headed out to sea.

Danger Will Robinson Danger.

Most DCs have no liability cover. If they get hold of it and clean out your account that’s tough. This is the only reason I have a CC, I’ve never required the credit, ever.

[golddog]

I wonder how much of account numbers being stolen starts from payment processing centers.

Every place tells you to write your account number on your check. The people who work at those places don't get paid much, seems like it would be easy to bribe them into copying those account numbers for you.

[Muck]

Every place tells you to write your account number on your check.

This must be a US thing. All my cheques have my account number on them.

[Ensano]

Every place tells you to write your account number on your check.

This must be a US thing. All my cheques have my account number on them.

ditto

[UrAteUp]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKCCIZQRg5U

Search youtube for the rest of this show. You might learn a few things about CC and ID Theft.

[Jernej Zorec]

some time ago there were cases of cards stolen here,
a tiny magnetic reader on the ATM machine and cam to see the numbers
was the case on few ATMs around slovenia

also the thing called POS terminal they have in stores, gas stations etc.
were found to be exchanged at some places so anyone who used it all information was also sent to the people who did it

as far as inet goes i wouldnt worry too much unless u have some kind of keylogger on your pc
i think normally inet transactions are pretty safe unless someone specifically targeted u imo or u happen to buy from some wierd place

[UrAteUp]

Every place tells you to write your account number on your check.

This must be a US thing. All my cheques have my account number on them.

I think Golddog is referring to when you pay your CC bill, they ask you to put your CC account number in the memo section of the check. This way if they say they never received payment, you can give them a copy of the check.

Jernej is right too. This type of scam do happen sometimes at POS terminals. I heard of a case where a guy was grabbing information through a POS system. He had setup a booth at a fair or some kind of social gathering, where he would do airbrushing, body painting and charactures of people. When they went to pay with credit card he got their information that way. Watch people at places like this who accept credit cards. That old record album or t-shirt you have to have could end up costing you more then the $15 your paying for it.

[raisebot]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKCCIZQRg5U

Search youtube for the rest of this show. You might learn a few things about CC and ID Theft.

Thanks for the link, was an interesting series of videos.

[Muck]

Every place tells you to write your account number on your check.

This must be a US thing. All my cheques have my account number on them.

I think Golddog is referring to when you pay your CC bill, they ask you to put your CC account number in the memo section of the check. This way if they say they never received payment, you can give them a copy of the check.

I don’t think this helps you prove you sent the money, it just means they if the CC bill slip and cheque get separated somehow the CC company still has a chance to identify whose CC bill you wanted to pay with the lone cheque.