talkmagic.co.uk

can you believe it? I tried to buy something today with my debit card and it got refused. So went to the bank to get cash out and the card's refused again.

The bank people phoned up their fraud department and it turns out some scruffy oik somewhere has got hold of my card details and thought they'd get themselves a little pressie, complements of me.

The best bit was that their transaction was for a whopping £2!!!!! If you're going to steal, at least make it worthwhile! I've now got to phone the fraud department up, after going over my statement and sort it out before they'll issue a new card.

Still, very pleased that the bank were on the ball and spotted it.

I spotted a couple of test purchases made to see if I was watching before Xmas. The thing is, I know it must have started with a "card holder not present" transaction at an online magic shop. I don't know my PINs so I never risk being skimmed in shops. Call the bank, they'll send you a form and they'll refund the money.

Interestingly, my bloody bank have a policy of updating all regular payees with your new details when your debit card number changes. One of the test transactions was to AOL, so the silly sods gave them the details of the new card. Chummy got a second month of broadband at my expense. Anyway, it's all sorted now and the person in question is no longer at liberty.

The whole thing has told me to NEVER use an online shop that handles its own transactions as if it were simple mail order - i.e. filling out a transaction slip. Always go for one using PayPal, CCBill or whatever as an escrow service.

Well I suppose it shows the system works to a certain extent but you'd think it would be easier to get things reset so you can use your card. Such thieving gits are all around us.

My youngest son was going overseas for New Year a couple of years ago and went to get money out of an ATM locally so he could get some foreign currency. He found his account had been cleaned out and was able to track it down to a bank machine used some days before where a false front had been fitted which recorded his details and allowed the card to be cloned. We stumped up the cash required to save the holiday and it was all rectified by the bank within a week but it was worrying how easy it was to copy the card.

Tomo wrote:The thing is, I know it must have started with a "card holder not present" transaction at an online magic shop.

Now that's interesting, my dodgey transaction was just a couple of days after using two online magic shops.

yeah, always cover your hand with your wallet when entering any numbers - atm or otherwise, you never know when people are shoulder surfing...

and i always run my hands over the atm's nowadays, see if anything moves...probably does no good, but i still do it...

EDIT: Lady of Mystery, which two shops out of interest?

There was something on the news this morning about card fraud going up despite chip and pin. To me, it feels like there are now just too many levels of abstraction in banking in general. I mean, it used to be that you went to the bank and they manipulated your account for you in person. Now you do it yourself. You may be on an https connection, but keyloggers see data before it enters the pipe, for instance. One slip in your security (not the bank's) and it's game over. The problem is, interviewing people for yet another piece on home PC security last year left me with the distinct impression that it's sometimes as much about faith and not thinking the unthinkable as it is software.

On the same type of subject "apparently" if you are mugged and marched of to a cash point to enter your pin number, and enter it backwards, it allows the transaction but notifies the police and blocks the card as well.

anyone know if this is true?

Chip and Pin also shifted a lot of the responsibility, and therefore the cost of any losses, away from the banks and back to the provider/supplier and the customer. I'm still trying to figure out why it's considered more difficult to fraudulently use 4 easily remembered digits compared to a unique handwritten signature .

jugglemonkey wrote:On the same type of subject "apparently" if you are mugged and marched of to a cash point to enter your pin number, and enter it backwards, it allows the transaction but notifies the police and blocks the card as well.

anyone know if this is true?

so if I were to enter 3491 . . . .
I don't know if it's true, but it's certainly a good idea...

Seems strange that it was only £2. Having said that, I suppose that way they are less likely to be followed up and caught, and if they do it to a lot of people it all adds up. Maybe I'm just wrong...

i think it's probably a tester...see if it sneaks through, then they go for it with something big...

It's another modern myth - entering the wrong PIN would just mean the ATM would reject the card.

I didn't really understand why it was only £2 either. But as said, the fine, upstanding member of our society was probabaly just testing the water to see if it would go through.

All sorted now, the card's been canceled and a new one is on the way. One tip I just got from someone at work is to make sure that if you use any online shops that store your card details, like Amazon. Change one number on their record so they always hold a wrong number.

Yes. I would reccomend that, but there is always the possibility that they could use the details from the previous transactions. . .

Let this be a lesson if you are going steal from Lady of Mystery steal a couple of grand. She would perfer it.

Markdini wrote:Let this be a lesson if you are going steal from Lady of Mystery steal a couple of grand. She would perfer it.

It'd make it more exciting if I could tell people that some big gangland heavy had taken a couple for grand from my account to fund their organised crime racket. Rather then someone had pinched a couple of quid.