New scam

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Long Run
Posts: 6717
Joined: Sat Apr 17, 2010 2:47 pm

New scam

Post by Long Run »

It is a new scam to me anyway. This one can catch someone who does nothing. Thief hacks into a personal bank account. They then not only try to drain the account, they go to all the check images for that account, both deposits and payments, to get the bank account numbers and routing numbers. The thief then sets up credit card accounts and uses those bank accounts to make payments to his credit card accounts (credit card companies and other online payees are incredibly lax about controls in this regard -- who would want to pay the account other than the rightful owner!). The only way to prevent this is to be diligent in checking your accounts as you have 60 days to challenge unauthorized transactions. This happened to someone I know and they were not diligent, and nearly everyone they've written a check to or received a check from had unauthorized withdrawals. This is clearly a way to impress your friends. Yikes, put this one in the column of things that aren't as good as they used to be.

Burning Petard
Posts: 4050
Joined: Fri Feb 12, 2016 5:35 pm
Location: Near Bear, Delaware

Re: New scam

Post by Burning Petard »

Also take advantage of the new 'free' option to freeze your account(s) at the three major credit reporting agencies. This prevents any new loan or credit cards being issued, unless you unfreeze the account.

snailgate

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Scooter
Posts: 16540
Joined: Thu Apr 15, 2010 6:04 pm
Location: Toronto, ON

Re: New scam

Post by Scooter »

I had to do that a few months back after an identity theft. Didn't result in any actual loss to me because none of my online accounts were hacked, but one of the pieces of advice I got was to avoid participating in any exchanges on social media where you are asked to share lists of info like the make of your first car, your favourite sport/meal/animal, etc. Whether or not they are started with malicious intent, these are the sorts of things used for security questions to access accounts and reset passwords.
"If you don't have a seat at the table, you're on the menu."

-- Author unknown

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Scooter
Posts: 16540
Joined: Thu Apr 15, 2010 6:04 pm
Location: Toronto, ON

Re: New scam

Post by Scooter »

Long Run wrote:The thief then sets up credit card accounts and uses those bank accounts to make payments to his credit card accounts (credit card companies and other online payees are incredibly lax about controls in this regard -- who would want to pay the account other than the rightful owner!).
Actually it does (or at least should) get flagged when the card and the account used to pay it are in different names; that was how the loan company where a loan was taken out in my name discovered the fraud, because the fraudster was using a bank account in someone else's name to make the payments.

Oh yeah, and another thing, you may have to get on the ass of the credit reporting agencies and the lenders who made the inquiries to get them removed from your credit report. There was one lender who insisted that an inquiry was legitimate even after Equifax had accepted that identity theft had occurred, and neither would agree to remove it until I threatened to sue.
"If you don't have a seat at the table, you're on the menu."

-- Author unknown

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