MSE News: Bogus mobile top-ups could spell greater fraud danger

Malc` · 22 August 2009 at 10:18AM

speedy gonzalez, what bank are you with? I'm looking to change and yours obviously did a good job of catching a fraudster. UK call centres would be nice too.....

speedy_gonzalez · 22 August 2009 at 1:38PM

It's Nationwide (I know they are a building society!). Just rung and spoke to their fraud dept about 30 minutes ago and the call was answered very quickly. It's the 2nd time it's happened to me. Last time I apparently bought a computer server in America and Nationwide were just as quick then.

Malc` · 23 August 2009 at 12:15PM

Thanks. I already have a nationwide account from when I went travelling - think I will move to them completely. It's happened to me before too, apparently I bought a surfboard for £400 in Scotland (I live in Wales), Barclays thought this was normal and let it go through.....

Former_MSE_Guy · 24 August 2009 at 5:53PM

We have written a full MSE News story about this bogus mobile topups issue, and this is the discussion thread. Please read the posts above this too to see all the prior discussion:

"Fraudsters are increasingly targeting the public by stealing their card details to pay for illegal mobile top-ups.

Such crimes are normally a pre-cursor to much larger raids on victims' accounts ..."

Read the full story:
Bogus mobile top-ups could spell greater fraud danger

Thanks to MoneySavers for originally reporting the problem.

mookiandco · 25 August 2009 at 12:47AM

I had two lots of £15.00 taken from my bank account 2 weeks ago both to top up O2 pay as you go phones. Barclays fraud department contacted me within 24hrs of this happening so they are obviously on the look out for it. Although I check my accounts a couple of times a month, I would not have noticed it quite so soon and by then it might have been too late. Apparently the fraudsters had also registered my card details with Oxfam first and apparently they do this to check that the details they have are correct.

Barclays were unable to tell me how my card details had been obtained. However I had not used the card for over 6 months except once on Play.com . There is another thread on MSE about card details being taken from Play.com and I can only assume but not prove that that is where my details were taken from.

amszephyr · 25 August 2009 at 10:47AM

I had 2 x £15 O2 tops ups taken from my Visa card moments after I'd submitted my card details online to Orange for a top up on my own phone. My top up failed as I'd not pre-registered my card details with Orange, but clearly somebody working at Orange took my details and used them to buy their own O2 top ups. My Visa company stopped the card immediately and refunded the charges and when I spoke to somebody at Orange customer services they claimed never to have heard of such an occurrence before.
I suspect the fault - in my case - lies with an Orange employee because the exact thing happened to a friend of mine straight after she'd submitted her card details to Orange over the phone and neither of us had given our card details to anybody else.

Apparently (according to the man I spoke to from Orange) the card comapnies/banks can ask the phone companies which phone accounts the fraudulent top ups were made to, but I wonder whether they feel it's worth their time?

tilburykaren · 26 August 2009 at 8:10AM

I was left a voicemail from my credit card company ( Tesco ) asking me to contact them on certain number as a matter of urgency. A work colleage worried me when she said it was probably a scam, so I rang them back on number on back of credit card ( different from number given me). Turns out true as two attempts made for £30 each for Vodafone top ups. They told me it was a big problem happening from a company in Germany. They successfully did a test purchase the day before somewhere else for a trivial amount 89p.
Had money refunded, but had inconvenience of cancelled card and wait for new one. But top marks for Tesco for prompt action!!

pablo2429 · 26 August 2009 at 8:20AM

I have also been charged by 02 £30.00 in feb this year.I check my accounts most days and only ever used my credit card through secure sites online never outside. Hsbc credited the money and sent a new card which i activated online. 2 weeks later i receive my renewal quote for my car insurance but instead of having my old card(which was de-frauded) it had my new card number.I had never used this card infact had cut it up into 3 pieces and hid separately and then end of July a charge of £59.00 was made in July for a renewal on norton software online. I have been credited the amount back but still await the answer from Hsbc as to how this is possible seems to me can only come from within the Bank no one but me(and Hsbc) has even seen the card and i didnt use on purpose because i think the bank has someone within its issuing system using/selling customers details.

HGLTsuperstar · 26 August 2009 at 10:02AM

I had a call on Monday from Nationwide credit card security, quering a transaction for guess what - £30 top-up on O2. I'm not even with O2 so told them it was nothing to do with me. They said my card had been stopped and a new one is on its way so no further transactions can go through but, they did say they had autorised this £30 one.
I of course said I'm not paying it and they assured me that if it does go through I can claim for a refund but still very concerned.
And now when I log on to online banking, can't even check as the credit card no longer shows, owing to it being stopped.

d.o.o.g · 26 August 2009 at 10:13AM

I had to get my M&S card replaced back in March after some rogue phone top-ups. Seems my card was cloned somewhere. Fair play to M&S though, they caught it straight away

MSE News: Bogus mobile top-ups could spell greater fraud danger

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