OT - Identity Theft

Fred19Flintstone

Who has dealt with this?  I had an issue today where my card was denied at the hardware store.  I called my financial institution and discovered my card was frozen due to "suspicious charges".  Two were mine, but the other was not.  Card was shut down and another is being issued.  I was lucky.

volfan1

I've had it a couple of times with my Chase card. The first one they caught and froze the account. The second one I caught while reviewing my bill and had the account frozen & the transaction refunded.  Always check those line items!

fishlessman

have not gotten any unauthorized charges but my card gets shut down regularly which is really frustrating. states are small here, if i charge in 3 within an hour or two its shut down, i can be in three states in 20 minutes.

DoubleEgger

Yup. I got hit with $9k worth of charges at Home Depot over Christmas. I hope the sorry SOB bought a saw and cuts his arm off using it. 

The wife got hit the other day for about $600. 

I hate a f-ing thief. 

Abter

I have had identify theft problems way to often.  I have a Citi credit card, and they are very quick to block me for 'suspicious activity'.  Its a pain in the neck. It is worse because my family...me, wife, and 2 adult children...all share the same card.  I finally yelled at them often enough that I convinced them that I not only live in a multi state region (Wash. DC metro area), but that we all travel a lot.  I was able to convince Citi to somehow enter into their data system that my home region included the 50 states + DC, as well as the Canadian provinces.  That cut down on the alerts.  It did not, however, affect the "oh...we see you bought 15 gallons gasoline at 1:40pm, and then at 1:45pm you bought another 12 gallons".  They can't seem to get it through their computers dense head that we are 4 people with 4 cars, and it is totally possible for us to happen to buy gas at the same time.  grrr.

Hotch

Back in around 1980 or so some body take a loan out in my wife's name somewhere in Mississippi and of course never paid it back.
To this day I still get a$$hole credit companies calling wanting money!! They just resale the debt over and over again.
I keep telling them "Send me a certified copy of original loan paper work to verify her signiture!" If not F?CK OFF!!

Abter

On a more serious identity theft issue; my confidential information has been hacked and stolen three times in the past 2 years.  Stolen from my employers...not from some store I used a credit card at.  I work for some pretty shady organizations:  I am a Federal employee, as well as having periodic part time jobs with the State of Maryland and the University of Maryland.  All 3 have had their entire personnel (and students at U MD) data hacked.  Even with all the anti-credit theft services that the feds and Maryland provide me at no cost, every month or three another stolen ID info scam comes through.  Just in April someone with all my essential info (full name, date of birth, address and SS #) opened a new account at Best Buy with a $2,500 line of credit.  They then proceeded to immediately spend $2,499.  Thats a warning sign right there.  Plus the account was opened about 6 states away from Maryland. 
Bottom line?   BE AFRAID, BE VERY AFRAID.  Or at least be very, very vigilant.  Just because I am paranoid doesn't mean that there aren't bad guys out there who are really trying to get me 

Legume

I get calls or messages from the bank about odd charges, usually they're right, but I haven't had them shut down the card without checking first.  Happens maybe 2x/ year, usually small charges where someone must be testing the number.

pgprescott

Happened to me a few years ago, but I caught it immediately and was fairly painless. I have Discovers version of Life-lock now. Its a PITA if you are out financing something, but is great piece of mind for $110/ yr. 

They opened a credit account in my name and charged like ten bucks worth of stuff. The fraud investigators said they hope it clears the first billing cycle then the change the address and wipe you out. luckily I was standing in the room when my wife mentioned that I must have opened a new account. I paused to think if maybe I had as it was the holiday season. Nope. Panic!!!!

gdenby

Couple of months ago, my cards, all 2 of them, were hit. One of my bank accounts was probed. The cards, both within about 1 hour. Nothing lost, and I was able to enjoy 3 - 5 business days w. no credit account.

Communicated w. an old friend who was pretty high up in financial tech.  4 of his last 6 business accounts had been hit. Several charges in Europe. His only comment was "Its a PITA. There's a leak somewhere."

My elderly father had a complete theft. 1st incident was a credit card account turned over to a dumb kid who tried to buy a surf board w. it. That was caught. Later ones, much worse. Cards issued in his name and immediately maxed out. His computer was completely controlled by outside operators. I spent more than a year trying to get rid of debt collectors, a few of whom continued to try and find out if he wasn't really dead, but living at my address.

johnkitchens

I agree with @Abter concerning Citi Cards. I am ashamed to admit this, but here goes. 

Citi always locks my card and calls during the holiday's because of the volume of online shopping. My wife uses my card, but they call me, and I then have to conference her in and go over the charges, and I then have to call the store and tell them the reason the charge was denied etc. Sometimes they will run the card again while I am on the phone, and I am done, but other times they make us go back to their site and reorder etc. Total pain in the butt. 

I never use my card, but my wife does all the time. I pay my statement in full every month. I admit I got lazy, and didn't pay attention to the charges like I should. In April when I was doing my taxes I discovered that In August of the previous year someone had charged a plane ticket from from Israel to Germany and from Germany to Las Vegas on my card for $1,600.00! 

I didn't catch it, and I paid the statement in full! I called Citi Cards and told them what happened, and it took almost three weeks, but they did give me credit for the $1,600.00.  

I then reamed them for not catching it. They call if I buy a pair of shoes, but international air travel and nothing! 

RRP

a few years back I received a call from my credit union checking to see if my wife or I were in Denver that morning. There had been a $1.19 charge at McDonald's followed by a $2,100+ purchase at a sporting goods store like 20 minutes later. My CU shut down the card, denied the charges and sent me a new card. 

Fred19Flintstone

My denied charge was in Canada.  I always thought Canadians were a polite, peaceful people.

RRP

Regarding nuianse questions about minor charges I understand the frustration, but at least my credit card provider seems to familiarize patterns or practices. Small insignificant purchases are triggers, but in my case I have numerous odd amount charges in the small $3 to $5 range at the USPO. It is not unusual for my monthly CC bill to have 40 to 50 such charges. 

fishlessman

citi is the only card ive had real problems with over the years. and citimortgage has been great, its like two different companies, night/day. i dont carry citi cards anymore

northGAcock

I was a victim of a fraudulent Tax fraud a few years back...as someone had filed a tax return under my SS number. The return had a Texas address on it. Hope it wasn't one of you Texans trying to scrape up enough money up to get that XXL for your collection. The IRS did not pay out to the fraudulent return as it was caught in time. Was a big PITA to get my return filled, and took a year to get my refund. Also had to file a police report and notify several other government agencies. It twas no fun I tell you.

volfan1

I think a lot of this may be a frenzy of activity before we see the widespread adoption of chip & pin cards here in the states. They've had it in Europe for years, and I've read that it really has cut back on credit card fraud. I only have one swipe only card, and I only use it for recurring charges.

dmchicago

I don't mind them shutting my card down if it stops the thief dead in his/her tracks. Small price to pay.

Once on the way back from business in Corpus, I stopped for lunch at Red Dog Ice House in Kenedy, TX. Payed with my Corporate Card.

By the time I got to Austin a few hours later and tried to gas up, the card was declined.

Called and someone in New Jersey was using the card.

Crafty bi*ches.

evie1370

Once our debit card was hit with a $10 charge at a sporting goods store in FL. Hubby reviews it daily online, caught it and they shut the card down. That is their modus operendi, start with a small charge and if that goes through they wipe you out. We were lucky.

Another time someone got ahold of his Visa but they caught it, called us then denied it.

When we went to Berlin and Copenhagen and later Charleston we called the card companies in advance, told them where we were going and when and never had a problem.

NorthPilot06

Terrible pain if you ask me.  It's happened to me three times.

First two times were on a CC issued by Chase.  Total purchases were in the range of $2-$10 in total and Chase's automatic fraud detection software picked up on them, shutting down the card on my behalf.

On the other hand, I picked up the Citi Prestige card a few months ago.  About 1 month into card membership I racked up three fraudulent charges worth ~$11,000.  Of course I wasn't responsible for the charges, but it was a bit disconcerting to have to log in and check my charge history to figure out that there was fraud (as opposed to the automatic fraud detection success that I had with Chase).

Unfortunate that folks have to be dishonest in this day and age...

U_tarded

Just happened to me on Tuesday.  About $60 got card **** off went to branch reviewed charges and they said 3 days or so money would be back and new card was on its way. 

Lit

Yeah got hit for a couple grand once.

McStew

Yah it happens more times then you can imagine AMex has been great for me.   

Ozzie_Isaac

Had this happen to me.  Apartment rented in my name, fake bank accounts setup in my name, over $8k in bad checks.

Took over 9 months to clean it up.  Luckily, a friend put me in touch with a VP at lifelock.  They took on my case.  They had it cleaned up in less than 1 month.

FBI and sheriffs got involved. 

I now have lifelock on my entire family.

I highly recommend their services.

Stoogie

I am dealing with this right now.

Got a call from the credit card fraud department back in early May asking about charges at Nike and.... of all places "Ourtime.com" which is a senior citizen dating website (I'm not a senior citizen).  They reversed the charges and issued my wife and I new cards.

Then exactly 3 weeks ago my home phone rings and it's some woman from Oklahoma who has my name, full address and phone number.  She wants to know if I'm trying to "date" her mother and who exactly I am.  

Long story short, someone is using my name on "Our Time", opened an email address in my name and is trying to scam widows out of their money.  Supposedly I travel the world trading gold and I was in Dubai the day I got the call.  3 days prior I had purchased a PlayStation 3 system for the woman's grandson because it was his birthday.

Who ever is using my name is using a very specific variation of my name, one that I'd only use for legal purposes.  I went back through statements and stuff like that and the last time I used that *specific* variation was when we booked a trip to Mexico, on Expedia.com in January and I had to list my legal name for passport reasons.  The trip was booked with the credit card that was fraudulently used.  

I've got fraud alerts on all 3 credit reporting bureaus now and I'm still trying to untangle everything.  

DoubleEgger

I had a fraud case after using Expedia one time. They suck. 

Fred19Flintstone

This thread is very educational!

NPHuskerFL

fishlessman said:

citi is the only card ive had real problems with over the years. and citimortgage has been great, its like two different companies, night/day. i dont carry citi cards anymore

Interesting. I'm gonna take a wild guess and say you didn't take advantage of a virtual number with online purchases. Citi has a lot of security measures in place to ensure its member's ID is safeguarded. I may know somebody that works for Citi. 
FWIW.... my ID has been compromised 3x. 2x by VA and their awesome information breach. And once by a hacker at a Target.  

HoustonEgger

I've had this happen to me twice - both times after using my card at the airport. Seems the scammers target the airport because they know you will be traveling and without access to phone/internet for some time and use that time window to go hog wild. 

My latest happened when I was traveling from TX to CA via plane and somehow stopped at Forever 21 in Phoenix, AX and charged about $350 before the bank shut it down (this was on my debit card). Had to go to a bank branch when I landed to get a temporary card for the duration of my visit. Talk about a time suck!

Now at the airport I only use cash for this specific reason - bunch of thieves!

Fred19Flintstone

Stoogie said:

I am dealing with this right now.

Got a call from the credit card fraud department back in early May asking about charges at Nike and.... of all places "Ourtime.com" which is a senior citizen dating website (I'm not a senior citizen).  They reversed the charges and issued my wife and I new cards.

Then exactly 3 weeks ago my home phone rings and it's some woman from Oklahoma who has my name, full address and phone number.  She wants to know if I'm trying to "date" her mother and who exactly I am.  

Long story short, someone is using my name on "Our Time", opened an email address in my name and is trying to scam widows out of their money.  Supposedly I travel the world trading gold and I was in Dubai the day I got the call.  3 days prior I had purchased a PlayStation 3 system for the woman's grandson because it was his birthday.

Who ever is using my name is using a very specific variation of my name, one that I'd only use for legal purposes.  I went back through statements and stuff like that and the last time I used that *specific* variation was when we booked a trip to Mexico, on Expedia.com in January and I had to list my legal name for passport reasons.  The trip was booked with the credit card that was fraudulently used.  

I've got fraud alerts on all 3 credit reporting bureaus now and I'm still trying to untangle everything.  

Does that mean I'm not going to meet my new Dad, Stoogie Woogie, next week after you came back from Tokyo?

gdenby

Stoogie said:

I am dealing with this right now.

Long story short, someone is using my name on "Our Time", opened an email address in my name and is trying to scam widows out of their money.  Supposedly I travel the world trading gold and I was in Dubai the day I got the call.  3 days prior I had purchased a PlayStation 3 system for the woman's grandson because it was his birthday.

Not your fault. Someone is trying to get the widow. My father fell prey to similar elder fraud. He was going to get a free new car. He had been awarded $120K from the Gates foundation. He was going to get another free car. He had won the European millionaire raffle, and for just $2.5K, the money would be deposited in his bank account upon receipt. And then the bank account was hit. (Stopped, the manager knew what was up, and called me.) He would not listen to me. He would not listen to Adult Protective services. When speaking to my uncles estate lawyers about such matters, they mentioned that sadly they had been involved in a case where a lady lost over $2 million. Not even enough left for burial.

Folks, if you are over 65, you are a target. If you are over 70, more so. Every year, it gets worse.