Fraudulent Transactions

newguy · May 20, 2011

Yesterday while looking through my bank account statement online I noticed a couple of o2 top-up tractions for £15 made the previous day. I'm not with o2, so alarm bells immediately rang. After researching it seems that this exact thing has been happening to a great many people. Somebody must have got hold of my card details and this was a method of testing the card to see if it had funds available. Thankfully I spotted it straight away and they deactivated the card and are going to refund the payments.

Nothing like this has ever happened to me before, and I'm at a loss to figure out exactly how my card details have fallen into the wrong hands. I don't use my card in petrol stations, or even shops for that matter. I suspect that it's more likely to relate to online purchases, as I know that security lapses are far from rare, whether software or employee related. It certainly makes you think about how vigilant you need to be...

chrisduggan · May 20, 2011

My credit card has been cloned a couple of times, someone took it abroad and spent up big at my expense. I have since lowered my card limits and am more weary. So frustrating when it happens. Well that's an understatement really..

BREWSTERS · May 20, 2011

Newguy, it most likely is a breach of security at some online store that holds your details - look at the recent Sony breach, 78million affected.

newguy · May 20, 2011

chrisduggan said:
My credit card has been cloned a couple of times, someone took it abroad and spent up big at my expense. I have since lowered my card limits and am more weary. So frustrating when it happens. Well that's an understatement really..

I certainly don't blame you. It's good to have one eye on damage limitation. I 'think' o2 now require more information before accepting topups (name, address etc), so I assume that in my particulalr case they got hold of more information. I can see how having your card cloned would be a nightmare situation, since they haven't yet introduced chip and pin in some countries.

BREWSTERS said:
Newguy, it most likely is a breach of security at some online store that holds your details - look at the recent Sony breach, 78million affected.

Yes, it seems like even some of the big companies are suseptable. If anything it probably makes them bigger targets. I'd like to think that companies like amazon are secure though. I might try to limit my online purchases to a very small number of retailers to minimise these issues.

wb · May 20, 2011

I had the exact same thing happen to me on my debit card last year (the transaction was O2 as well).

When I did some reading up on it, opinions seemed to point to O2 having low security for fraudsters to test out card details with. There was also something I came across which said that some people were using algorithms to work out valid card details and test them automatically somehow using O2 (not sure how accurate that is though).

Didn't use debit card online much before anyway, and to give credit to the bank they did refund the transaction amount instantly, but for extra security I only ever use credit card online now.

DomCollect · May 20, 2011

Happened to me once, just before Christmas.

A parcel arrived at the door full of jeans and shoes which would never of fitted me so i went to my online banking and saw that i had lost everything in a matter of days. Cleaned right out before i had started my Christmas shopping

I got all the money back but the strangest thing was the first "Test" transaction was giving money to a well known charity. Can you imagine not only do they take nearly 3k but they give 50 Quid to charity. Bloody Robbing Hoods

Laughing now but it is a strange feeling as i had only used the card once in months so it was definitely cloned. I too dropped by limits and never let it out of sight when paying for goods.

Funny thing was i sold a domain to a lady called Nancy (Nancy.de) recently, it was a present from her husband and she paid five figures for it but refused to book money online as her husband, a senior adviser to one of the largest banks in Germany, told her never to use the internet for transactions, not even online banking. He told her that it was the unsafest way to transfer money and the banks would never be able to keep up with the crooks.

Makes you think

newguy · May 20, 2011

That's shocking DomCollect. Halifax have let me know that since I informed them of this, there have been attempts to use the card of multiple occasions (to purchase a national express ticket, and numerous attempts with apple in the US. All online I think, though since they have the details I guess they could make a physical copy too).

In some ways I think the banks could streamline how they go about this. In the process of getting this sorted they have contacted me via numerous telephone number, and asked me to confirm transactions via text and voice call, confirming certain security information. It leaves you in a place, where you half question who is even calling you to confirm these details!!

Sam · May 20, 2011

I had the same issue i checked my statment and i had several large 02 topups funny thing was i didnt have 02 and i have a contract phone . I did some searching and i found out my card details has been sold on some forum on the internet i reported the site but it didnt get taken down . The scary thing is they had all my details . This seems to happen alot people selling card details on to people .

Wizard

newguy · May 20, 2011

wizard said:
I had the same issue i checked my statment and i had several large 02 topups funny thing was i didnt have 02 and i have a contract phone . I did some searching and i found out my card details has been sold on some forum on the internet i reported the site but it didnt get taken down . The scary thing is they had all my details . This seems to happen alot people selling card details on to people .

Wizard

Wow, how did you manage to track down your own details? Maybe I can find mine (not that it matters so much now).

Sam · May 20, 2011

I just googled a home number and postcode and bingo found a forum full of mine and other peoples card details.

I reported the site but nothing happened to it . Someone was selling the details its crazy tho this happens all the time !