Credit Card Fraud

Personal Finances Living Below Your Means
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My credit card statement arrived Friday reporting two fraudulent charges. Going on line to report same I found another one. Total about $360.

Credit card company is removing them, cancelled card and issuing a replacement. Advised to file police report.

Police say crime is not in their jurisdiction. But if police report is needed report to ic3.gov. Advised to do a credit report for possible opening of new credit accounts. (None found.)

I think I fell for a phishing email. A reputable company, I think Home Depot, offered me a free iPhone as a thank you gift. Just pay $2.95 in shipping charges.

Remind me once more. If it sounds too good to be true, avoid it.

Watch those credit card statements. Crooks are out there.

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That’s a good reminder. I don’t look into detail that much each charge on my card. The few times my credit card was compromised, it was due to using a tampered gasoline pump. I don’t know if it is safer but I’m using the tap the card feature rather than insert the card.

PSU

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I looked at my bank account on line yesterday … and saw that someone on Saturday moved $8,640 to a bank in Utah. “Ally bank” about which I knew nothing. We have had terrible trouble, and I mean terrible trouble trying to get Bank of America to listen or do something about this awful event. As of today they have STILL not sent by e-mail the form we have to fill out that the fraud department promised us.
It is awful. And how did someone get into our bank account anyway?

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Add phone scam?
I got an SMS last week - something like:
VZN. Your payment has posted.
Click for reward.

VZ is my carrier.
I “spaced out” and didn’t recognize that VZN is not VZ.
And clicked the link.
Fortunately, at the link, I grokked it was a scam, and I didn’t click anything on the link.

It’s dangerous out there. And it only takes a nano-second of “inattention, unawareness”.

:mask: :eyes:
ralph

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Replying to Paul’s OP, but applicable to the several follow on posts:

Does anyone have a LIFELOCK subscription?

I THINK these are the kind of problems they’re supposed to circumvent.

Preventing the fraud, in real time, not after the fact. At least that’s the sales schpiel.

Then, if there’s a problem (fraud/theft), they’re supposed to spend up to $1,000,000 to fix it.

$100 per year. (They want another $100 to cover spouse, which I’ve ignored.)

We have it. We’ve gotten ‘heads up’ notices, but no thefts, no frauds.

(We DO look at monthly bank and CC statements, do at least a two minute glancing line item audit-verification. Have not spotted a ‘gotcha’ in over twenty years.)

The stories on this thread have got my attention.

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Re Lifelock: I’ll pass. Here’s why: https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/finance/lifelock-review

Everyone here knows this, I think, but it’s worth repeating: Never, ever click on links in emails unless you check it out first carefully and are expecting it. Never click on links to random stuff forwarded to you by friends. If in doubt, go directly to the alleged website (Home Depot, Verizon, Spectrum, Visa, whatever) directly yourself, by typing it into the browser, and start there.

Here’s one I got today from “no-repIy@amazon.com” telling me that my order’s on hold and “click here” to update my payment information; but the actual email address of the sender is obviously a fraud: n??o?-?r?e?p?I?y?@?a?m?a?z?o?n?.?c?o?m jidhhzjnhlbwshj-f3vde78ehhodacjq@googlegroups.com

Note the capital “I” rather than lower-case “l” in “no-repIy”.

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It might be a bit overkill, but if your have an hour, there is free training on how to recognize phishing (and other cyber attacks) available through cyber.mil. I have to take similar training for work annually and it’s worth a look as a reminder. An hour here may save you lots of time later. An ounce of prevention and all that.

https://public.cyber.mil/training/phishing-awareness/

Pham

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This morning credit card company has credited all three fraud items. New card and number due tomorrow. Prompt service. Police sent officer in abt 30 minutes.

I’d rate the response I got very good!!

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Seems I haven’t been missed by the would be schemers.

Received a text message this morning informing me that Kevin had sent me $750 and inviting me to… Not sure what the fraudsters want me to do as I didn’t open the text and daren’t even try to delete it lest I inadvertently do so.

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I think I fell for a phishing email. A reputable company, I think Home Depot, offered me a free iPhone as a thank you gift. Just pay $2.95 in shipping charges.

Hover your mouse pointer over the address of the sender. The Emails like you describe are usually from a nonsensical address, not @HomeDepot.com. That works on my computer and my phone will also reveal the sender’s Email address, but my iPad doesn’t seem to have a way to do that, so I leave suspect Emails for a different device.

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Replying to Paul’s OP, but applicable to the several follow on posts:

Does anyone have a LIFELOCK subscription?

I THINK these are the kind of problems they’re supposed to circumvent.

Preventing the fraud, in real time, not after the fact. At least that’s the sales schpiel.

No, LIFELOCK doesn’t claim to prevent bogus credit card charges, that would be next to impossible. What they will do is notify you if someone tries to apply for a credit card, car loan, etc. using your social security number.

In August we had Ida come through and knocked out our power. My plans were to evacuate to north of Jackson, Mississippi with DW’s 3 cats. DW would drive her car and I would take my pickup to a nephew’s house. I would buy a 5 or 3.5 KW generator and return to do yard cleanup, etc. until full power was restored and DW could return with the cats. I have 2 credit cards, a cash-back card with Fidelity and a second one through Amazon, both with around $5,000 credit limit. I had a card through Bank America but them turkeys kept increasing the limit on it until it had a credit limit of a bit over $16,000. I never used it and a couple of years ago they canceled the card.

Anyway, to make a long story a little longer, the power company managed to jury rig a fix on the day we were packing up to leave. After the storm passed I went to Lowe’s to buy something and found my Fidelity card, which I use for local purchases like gas, groceries, etc., was maxed out. My usual monthly bill on that card is usually around $1,000. I went on line to the Fidelity site and identified 3 bogus charges for over $3,500. I called Fidelity and had those charges removed. They told me that they were sending me a new card, which I could expect in 3 or 2 days. Since our mail goes through N’Orleans, it axe-u-lee took over 10 days. While waiting for the new card, I noticed a new charge of something like $550.00 on the day after Ida knocked out our power, which I, of course, disputed and had removed. When the “girl” at Fidelity asked me “Are you sure that you didn’t order something from this company?” I told her that would I call XYZSoftware Company to order some thing with the power out, cooking by candle light and cleaning out the refrigerators and freezer prior to evacuating, huuuggh? She agreed with me that it was a bogus charge.
:wink:

C.J.V. - and I couldn’t use the Amazon card for gasoline because it has a bad chip on it
;-(

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Yes, that usually works for me. Or look at the full header to see who sent and where reply goes. This one seemed authentic.

I need to be more careful.

Replacement credit card arrived. All seems to be ok.

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voelkels:
No, LIFELOCK doesn’t claim to prevent bogus credit card charges, that would be next to impossible. What they will do is notify you if someone tries to apply for a credit card, car loan, etc. using your social security number

CJV: But did/DO you have LifeLock? Doesn’t sound like it from your post.(?)

Preventing in realtime: LL DOES claim to stop fraud CC charges IN REAL TIME. (I have NOT had that ‘call/experience’, so far, but that is their claim.)

As I wrote before, I’ve gotten heads up notifications from LL, but no fraud use. YET.

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LL DOES claim to stop fraud CC charges IN REAL TIME.

Link, please?

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Link, please?

https://www.lifelock.com/learn/credit-finance/credit-freezes…
(You’ll still have to do more clicking beyond the link, but it’s a start.)

More useful reading:
Lifelock 2021 Review
https://www.forbes.com/advisor/personal-finance/lifelock-rev…

This is starting to sound more like advertising for the company; I wonder if I can get them to pay a commission???

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CJV: But did/DO you have LifeLock? Doesn’t sound like it from your post.(?)

Preventing in realtime: LL DOES claim to stop fraud CC charges IN REAL TIME. (I have NOT had that ‘call/experience’, so far, but that is their claim.)

As I wrote before, I’ve gotten heads up notifications from LL, but no fraud use. YET.

Yes, I do have Lifelock. If someone were to apply for a credit card, car loan, etc. using my social security, LL would call or e-mail me and ask me if it was me applying for the CC, loan, etc. For bogus CC charges, LL would have to call me every time I use my CC, which would be impossible, since I may charge stuff at 4 or 3 different stores, gas stations, etc. in one day.

If I lose my CC, I can freeze it so that anyone that finds (or steals it) cannot use it to charge items on it until I “unfreeze” it. I can dispute unauthorized charges to my CC unlike a debit card, which I refuse to carry/have.
:wink:

C.J.V.

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BrerBear wrote, https://www.lifelock.com/learn/credit-finance/credit-freezes……
(You’ll still have to do more clicking beyond the link, but it’s a start.)

BrerBear, I read all that you linked to, plus a good bit more. It discusses protection against identity theft, credit monitoring, activity alerts, etc. It says nothing about preventing credit card fraud in real time, which is what I asked about. No service I’m aware of can do that.

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BrerBear wrote, Try looking here

Um, that’s a login page. Never mind.

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MrF preventing credit card fraud in real time,

Two weeks ago, I clicked a YouTube ad and bought an over the air TV antenna, from some outfit in Singapore.
Seconds after the transaction was complete*, I got a pop-up on my phone, from my CC (MC in this case) asking had I made the purchase?
After opening my CC app, and verifying everything, I replied “yes”, and the transaction proceeded.

IIRC, I enabled some “alert” things on the CC account 3 or 5 months ago.

But, this was about as “real time” as it gets?

I continued to monitor my CC for a few days. A seemed copacetic. I reviewed all the transactions 2 days ago, and all still seems good.

:+1:
ralph

  • I had clicked “submit order”, had just received the “confirmation” window, and I was reviewing the shipping vs billing addresses, when the “potential scam” alert from my CC popped open.
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I enabled some “alert” things on the CC account

Yep, I set up notifications on all my CC’s. They text me if there’s a charge with “card not present,” regardless of the amount. It’s an FYI, and I don’t have to reply.
Although, sometimes they do take it upon themselves to ask for a reply, generally if the amount is high or if the company is a place where I haven’t shopped before.