Please read...credit card compromised

[e-man67]

So I have only used my credit card lately for stogie purchases and or accessories. I have used some of the international pay sites in the last few weeks. I got a call from my credit card company asking me to confirm 2 recent charges on my account. Whomever got ahold of my charge tried to charge 2 different charges for $14 for Skype. I told the credit card company NO I did not authorize this and they immediately closed the account. Just saying be carefull out there...it can happen any place at any time...the last time this happened (about a year ago) I took the wife and kids to a local pizza joint and the server stole the number and charged things. I never would have guessed b/c the guy was very polite and I always tip well...you just never know. :mad:

[smitdavi]

I work for a credit card processor and see it everyday. It's almost impossible to protect yourself 100%. Just be careful and always check your account.

[BeerAdvocate]

Just max your credit card out with cigar purchases and there wont be any room left for someone to make unauthorized charges :D

[Linus]

I recently had two credit cards compromised, including my business card to the tune of nearly $7000. In both cases, the CC Companies contacted me, revoked the cards, removed the charges and issued new ones. One of the things I give them credit for is that they now monitor purchases and know people's habits (both a good and bad thing, IMO). As a result, I got protected from someone trying to scam me. It's good that they picked up on the small purchases as well.

[e-man67]

Yep, I have a friend here at work and he had the same thing happen to him. He noticed 2 charges on his account for the Wall Street Journal and he called his credit card company and told them he did not authorize. The credit card company said this happens all the time. What the scammer/thief will do is make a small charge to see if the card is valid and if it goes through then they do the large charges. It sucks....:mad:

[md4958]

My wife was picking up food at Friendly's a couple weeks ago, and she noticed the cashier was typing on her cell phone while she was looking at my wifes card. WTF!?!?!

She canceled the card before she even pulled out of the parking lot. She cant prove that the girl was stealing her card #, but she couldn't disprove it either.

[e-man67]

It sucks for sure...you would think people that work for a living and know how hard it is to make a buck wouldn't steal......pisses me off to no end. :fl

[TripleF]

Dayum. Unbelievable. We remember when NOBODY had credit cards, and now there's an ad for a credit card company on every televison viewing.

Eliminate your cc's and the problem can just about be eliminated.

[DocLogic77]

Just max your credit card out with cigar purchases and there wont be any room left for someone to make unauthorized charges :D

I like how you think. :D

[loki]

My wife was picking up food at Friendly's a couple weeks ago, and she noticed the cashier was typing on her cell phone while she was looking at my wifes card. WTF!?!?!

She canceled the card before she even pulled out of the parking lot. She cant prove that the girl was stealing her card #, but she couldn't disprove it either.
tell the manager, that girl needs fired

[kaisersozei]

Out of the blue, SunTrust sent my wife & I replacement debit cards this weekend. Something about a potential security breach involving a large quantity of account numbers. They said to their knowledge so far no one was hit (at least not our accounts, anyway...) but they were just taking some precautionary measures.

I don't know whether to feel relieved or more concerned. :confused: At least they were proactive.

[14holestogie]

My CC company is also pro-active. They even checked out my own purchases overseas when they seemed excessive (must have the same thought process as my wife. :D)

Had a Discover card a couple years back that someone tried to buy a computer with and was caught by the CC company and new cards were sent.

[smitdavi]

Out of the blue, SunTrust sent my wife & I replacement debit cards this weekend. Something about a potential security breach involving a large quantity of account numbers. They said to their knowledge so far no one was hit (at least not our accounts, anyway...) but they were just taking some precautionary measures.

I don't know whether to feel relieved or more concerned. :confused: At least they were proactive.

The company I work for recently had a breach that we announced back in February. As a precaution a lot of banks and other card issuers are proactively sending out new cards. Only numbers were compromised, no personal info was taken, but it did happen and we took the appropriate measures to make sure it never happens again. Here is a website that we set up: 2008 Breach Website (http://2008breach.com/)

[Lensjockie]

My workplace had our personal data compromised.
Email accounts, bank info, personal data, and who knows what else.
37 new internet accounts later, at least as many charges, and a whole lot of time on the phone telling people yes it was my data but not me who did it, and we still are dealing with it.
In short turns out hackers sell the lists to each other and start the cycle over again.

You can always call the credit agencies and but a fraud alert, at least that is free.

Lensjockie

[BORIStheBLADE]

This kind of stuff sucks..:c My CC was compromised at about election time. It was my credit card that sat in my dresser for 3+ months because it was still smoking from the CC purchases I have made.

I don't know if anyone remembers that a online credit card middle man got hacked and they got tons of peoples info.

[ucla695]

Sorry to hear that. It's a good idea to frequently monitor accounts that are used for online purchases. Just in case, I only use a card with a low limit for these.

[St. Lou Stu]

Just max your credit card out with cigar purchases and there wont be any room left for someone to make unauthorized charges :D

Fantastic approach!

Mine was also hit recently, for $579 at nflshop.com.
I actually caught it online and I thought my wife was being thoughtful for my upcoming birthday so I asked what she got me at the NFL shop..... she said 'nothing'....... reality then set back in and I realized that I had been screwed. Twice.

[smitdavi]

Fantastic approach!

Mine was also hit recently, for $579 at nflshop.com.
I actually caught it online and I thought my wife was being thoughtful for my upcoming birthday so I asked what she got me at the NFL shop..... she said 'nothing'....... reality then set back in and I realized that I had been screwed. Twice.

Ouch, talk about a kick to the junk.

[jjirons69]

Fantastic approach!

Mine was also hit recently, for $579 at nflshop.com.
I actually caught it online and I thought my wife was being thoughtful for my upcoming birthday so I asked what she got me at the NFL shop..... she said 'nothing'....... reality then set back in and I realized that I had been screwed. Twice.

No thrice screwed? :rolleyes: You deserved it!

[Smokin Gator]

I just got a call from my bank. Someone tried to charge $20,000 and $10,000 against my card which had recently been used ONCE by a vendor.

[St. Lou Stu]

No thrice screwed? :rolleyes: You deserved it!

Yeah! I wish it worked that way!
I'd have a permagrin! :D

I should also clarify......

This card has not been used for any vendor transactions.

It is my travel and big item card only.

I use gift cards for purchases.. they are a very cheap insurance policy for this type of thing.

[e-man67]

I just got a call from my bank. Someone tried to charge $20,000 and $10,000 against my card which had recently been used ONCE by a vendor.


Damn...that sucks!!!!! Be safe people and check your statements!

[St. Lou Stu]

Damn...that sucks!!!!! Be safe people and check your statements!


No worries...... My wife checks them VERY carefully! :r

[SNKBYT]

being deployed I only use a low limit cc for purchases and check my statements and credit often to ensure no wrong doings

[shadow king]

I just got a call from my bank. Someone tried to charge $20,000 and $10,000 against my card which had recently been used ONCE by a vendor.



Man this is VERY troubling. Are you going to contact that vendor and ask them WTF? Any updates on the situation would be greatly appreciated.

Matt

[icantbejon]

I got a call from my credit card company asking me to confirm 2 recent charges on my account. Whomever got ahold of my charge tried to charge 2 different charges for $14 for Skype. I told the credit card company NO I did not authorize this and they immediately closed the account.

Exact same thing just happened to my wife and I. A totally random $13 purchase on skype. We closed our card as well. Clearly this is some way they test the validity of the card. Interesting.

I didn't use this card for any type of cigar purchases though, just throwing that out there.

[Smokin Gator]

Yes, I have contacted the vendor. They said they just installed a new highly secure system within the last week. I told them it was one heck of a coincidence that two of us had used the same vendor and had a problem in the last week.

BTW... the card I used was on a brand new account. It had only been used twice and the other was a local liquor store where I have done business for years.

I may go the pre-paid route from now on.

[Linus]

I just got a call from my bank. Someone tried to charge $20,000 and $10,000 against my card which had recently been used ONCE by a vendor.

Wow. So either the vender is unethical or their site has been compromised. :(

[cricky101]

I got a visa card through Wells Fargo (where I bank) with a $1,000 credit limit I use just for online purchasing.

I think it was originally offered as overdraft protection - so if I bounce a check it will cover the charge - but has the same fraud protections as a standard credit card.

[Moglman]

I know it's been posted elsewhere, but I just got slammed with fraudulent charges. $1646 and $6187 to "Thinq Learning Development" and a $500 Poopal charge. PP was declined, and the others I need to talk to the credit union about tomorrow. I got multiple fraud calls on these and the card is closed.

This has been discussed on multiple boards but check your cards and take preemptive action. It's an epidemic for the cigar community.

[csbrewfisher]

I check my account balance every day, and this is a good reminder that it is justified to do so. :tu

[BradNC]

I have a "poopal" account and use their one time generated credit card number option if the site looks questionable or if I feel uneasy. That eliminates the concern for me in that "sitchiation".

[CueTheMusic]

Yep, I have a citi card, and use their virtual account number feature. It is nice because you can set an expiration date and a max amount on the virtual number, so I'll set the max amount to a few dollars above my purchase, and set it to expire soon after I use it.

[BigFrank]

Thanks for the heads up. Luckily I have yet to have this happen to me, key word yet. I know a few guys who have had to deal with someone else charging crap on their card. Most companies are pretty decent about bad charges though.

[shadow king]

I came home last night to discover that I have $644 in unauthorized multiple transactions on my card. Just spent a good hour down at the bank getting things worked out and discovered some disturbing similiarities between my charges and another BOTL on here who had the same charges from the same places. We both have made purchases from a vendor who is wildly popular on this forum. This is the 3rd incident that I know of with this vendor. Their website has either been compromised or they have a dishonest thief working for them. I strongly recommend that anyone who is a regular with this place stay away from them until things can get resolved one way or the other. This is the first time I have had this type of thing happen to me ever. Given their reputation, I feel this might be a temporary thing with a bad employee...I hope.

[dunng]

There are actually 15+ sites hosted on the same server... It seems that the server or card processor has been compromised. :c

[e-man67]

Yeah, to make things worse I gave my home phone for this purchase and I have been getting phishing phonecalls every day since...I guess this is a new techinque or something since I closed my card down...they call and act like a doctors office, dentist, florist, all kinds of wierd stuff asking for someone then asking me for personal info...this sucks and what a hassle...I'm done. :mad:

[Waynegro1]

Last year I was in Italy to visit family and only used my CC a couple times. I got back to the states and a few weeks later I noticed almost $2,000 in extra charges on my card. I called the CC company and they said the charges took place in Spain (I won''t even tell you what shops it was used at, let's just say it took some explaining) :confused:. I didn't leave Italia once and had charges in Spain!! It was taken care of, but you're dead on, pay attention to your bill just in case.
Thanks for the reminder. :tu

[Old Sailor]

I came home last night to discover that I have $644 in unauthorized multiple transactions on my card. Just spent a good hour down at the bank getting things worked out and discovered some disturbing similiarities between my charges and another BOTL on here who had the same charges from the same places. We both have made purchases from a vendor who is wildly popular on this forum. This is the 3rd incident that I know of with this vendor. Their website has either been compromised or they have a dishonest thief working for them. I strongly recommend that anyone who is a regular with this place stay away from them until things can get resolved one way or the other. This is the first time I have had this type of thing happen to me ever. Given their reputation, I feel this might be a temporary thing with a bad employee...I hope.

Does this place know of the comprimise though?

[BengalMan]

Another member on here that I'm personal friends with had his card stolen from this same vendor a week or so ago. Same song and dance with the Skype stuff. This is very bad news that it's now consistently happening.... At this point, I think it's wise that EVERYONE stay away from this site and any site connected with them for a bit until this blows over. There's no reason for fellow BOTL's to get scammed. This is obviously an on-going issue that needs to be addressed.

[LasciviousXXX]

The problem with the above theory is that there are instances of this happening very recently where no card was used at any of the associating sites.

Might be an indicator of something on a larger scale than just vendors. :2

[e-man67]

Does this place know of the comprimise though?


Yes, they do...several of us called them and their response was "we don't keep any cc info that it is destroyed after each purchase"....BS

[The Professor]

The problem with the above theory is that there are instances of this happening very recently where no card was used at any of the associating sites.

Might be an indicator of something on a larger scale than just vendors. :2
Seems like it's not a problem with the vendors, per se, but with the common credit card processor used. I believe that the *vendors* don't keep the credit card information (or even see it); but the processor they use have traces (records) of that in their system.

But the instances where no card was used at the offending sites might be just an example of a different kind of fraud. It seems that there are distinct/different kinds of charges that are coming up, which might indicate completely separate criminal rings. An unfortunate coincidence that they're happening at the same time ... in part because it confuses the issue.

Scary stuff....

[rizzle]

Sheesh. Always gotta be worrying about something.

[maxnmisty435]

can someone pm me the name of this vendor? I had the Skype BS about two weeks ago and have no Idea which vendor to be careful of.

[14holestogie]

Just checked my card again, and still safe.

Anybody hear of and/or use the SafePass from Bank of America. It sounds like they assign a 6 digit number to the end of a partial card number for each transaction, thereby eliminating the chance of this type of thing happening.
They either text the 6 digits to your mobile phone or you can buy a stand alone card for a one time fee of $19.95. It may be worth checking into.

Anybody have or use something similar?

[shadow king]

Just checked my card again, and still safe.

Anybody hear of and/or use the SafePass from Bank of America. It sounds like they assign a 6 digit number to the end of a partial card number for each transaction, thereby eliminating the chance of this type of thing happening.
They either text the 6 digits to your mobile phone or you can buy a stand alone card for a one time fee of $19.95. It may be worth checking into.

Anybody have or use something similar?

Have not heard of that. But I did some checking out, I went to creditcards.com and looked into a prepaid card. The one I'm looking into only accepts transactions when you have a balance on the card. So if you only want to use it for certain purchases, run the balance out when you're done and if your card gets compromised, it shouldn't run up a bunch of charges in theory at least.



can someone pm me the name of this vendor? I had the Skype BS about two weeks ago and have no Idea which vendor to be careful of.


Sounds like you got hit too by the same people as us. I think I need to clarify that its not the vendor but the billing company. I'm not sure if we're allowed to even say which one without getting shushed. This is a very serious epidemic that is facing fellow BOTL's. It's not gonna take long to put 2 and 2 together by the people who will be investigating the credit card frauds.

[fissure]

Got the call from the cabelas visa today for a $349 possible charge for a telecommunications company overseas. Glad the company actually looks out for its customers. Closed down the card:tu Will definitely have to look into some other way to pay in the future if I ever order anything else. My last order was in early march, so don't think you are out of the woods if you haven't made a recent purchase.

[Old Sailor]

Just noticed 4 charges, 2 days apart each on my card......all fixed and card no good anymore. Some company in England.:mad:

[14holestogie]

My account is still clean, but I'm still looking for more security.

Bank of America also has a free service for online transactions called ShopSafe. They generate a unique card number for each transaction that bills to your usual number. One use, and the number does you (or nobody else) any good to try to re-use. I am definitely going to try that out with the next order. Check into it. I would think other bank cards should have something similar. :tu

[cbsmokin]

There have been a lot of people experiencing unauthorized charges recently, myself included. Mine was 6/9 to moneybookers for over $300. All scam victims have used one of the vendors from the same processing area. The unauthorized charges usually show a few days to about a week after a legit purchase. Please watch out.

[14holestogie]

I just placed an order using ShopSafe as described in my previous post. It took about 2 minutes to generate a new number with a credit limit and expiration date of my choosing. Scammers are welcome to the $2.48 left on the card. Sweet. :tu

[shadow king]

I just placed an order using ShopSafe as described in my previous post. It took about 2 minutes to generate a new number with a credit limit and expiration date of my choosing. Scammers are welcome to the $2.48 left on the card. Sweet. :tu



Be very carefull to read the fine print on your TOS. On the prepaid card I have it says it may place a charge even tho you don't have the full funds to cover it.

The best way just might be to run the card down to nothing when you're done using it.

Also has everyone that has been having trouble with this vendor been emailing them to let them know they have a serious breach of security with their processing system? It makes you wonder wtf is going on if they are still having problems. Could it be that they just don't care....

[Smoking Dragon]

A few months ago I got a letter from my bank saying that the debit accounts were "possibly" hacked. I soon recieved a new card with a new number. I still am getting calls from companies saying that they can lower my interest rate on the card that is no longer valid. I feel good knowing that the company wasted threir money on CC numbers that are not valid. :banger

Sarge

[smitdavi]

Seems like it's not a problem with the vendors, per se, but with the common credit card processor used. I believe that the *vendors* don't keep the credit card information (or even see it); but the processor they use have traces (records) of that in their system.

But the instances where no card was used at the offending sites might be just an example of a different kind of fraud. It seems that there are distinct/different kinds of charges that are coming up, which might indicate completely separate criminal rings. An unfortunate coincidence that they're happening at the same time ... in part because it confuses the issue.

Scary stuff....

I guess I can comment on this. Some merchants can and do have access to full credit card numbers and exp. dates. They can have this info on their reports as long as it is under lock and key somewhere. But there has been a large movement to make all reports truncated, meaning that all the merchants have access to ONLY the last 4 digits of the card. My company, Heartland, strongly recommends this and really frowns upon merchants having access to all numbers and exp. dates.

When we had our breach there were serious rumblings about the Russian Mob being heavily involved in this kind of activity.

[e-man67]

Be very carefull to read the fine print on your TOS. On the prepaid card I have it says it may place a charge even tho you don't have the full funds to cover it.

The best way just might be to run the card down to nothing when you're done using it.

Also has everyone that has been having trouble with this vendor been emailing them to let them know they have a serious breach of security with their processing system? It makes you wonder wtf is going on if they are still having problems. Could it be that they just don't care....

I don't think they care...a few of us called and never got called back...many people getting burned. Thanks for keeping this alive Shadow!