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

burnsahole

I had this too, two lots of £15 taken exactly the same day, for O2 topups. Contacted my bank. They investigated and have now had money refunded. No other signs on my account of any misuse. Haven't a clue how card details were obtained, but feel better for knowing I'm not the only one.

slayer1

this has happend to me it could quite possibly be employee fraud.
i personally am holding the blame to abbey, as my card was allegedly blocked, because of this i had an automated voicemail left on my home phone telling me to call them.
After verifying the number (which was an abbey call centre number) i spoke to an employee who asked me to verify my card, i was happy to do so as this employee had just read back to me my recent purchases and relevant personal details which only they would of known. then he put me through to the "fraud office" which also took my details and then told me my card was unblocked.
I then used my card online to check it was not blocked and thought nothing of it, then 4 days later at the bank noticed 2 payments of £30 to o2 uk prepay.
I had the card blocked, got a new one sent and the funds will be returned to me.

Now im going to give my reasoning over why i think it is someone in an abbey call centre not playing straight, and anyone with any input or suggestions, i would be gratefull to hear them.
1. the 2 initial abbey operatives i spoke two asked for the 16 digit strip no and the 3 digit security no and expiry date.

2.the timeings of when i gave that information are an exact match of when the two o2 payments were deducted.

3.the first member of abbey staff i spoke said my card was blocked and in order to lift that block he required the card information ( 16 digits, 3 digits and expiry date) upon cancelling this card and reporting the fraud, i asked if my card was actually ever blocked, they said no but it was flagged, which is why i received a voicemail at my home to call abbey.

4. the number on my home phone was an abbey number but only a call centre not the fraud office which it was claimed to be upon my intial call.

i think all the above are fair reasons to expect foul play at abbey, but there was certain naiveity onn my part. just wanted to let people know so they do not fall for the same thing, i also do not feel this is o2's fault.
any input from anyone, i would be gratefull.

p.s just to add if my card had been cloned or details were stolen from internet use i am in no doubt all my money would have been stolen, which makes me more sur staff are misusing details as only £60 pound was taken. (probably so i wouldnt notice, then at some point the rest would follow.)

this all just seems to be to much much coincedince and correct me if im wrong but the o2 payment would of been an instant payment and for that to happen whilst im on the phone to abbey doesnt sit right with me. and just to add they ran through all my pending purchases on that first phone call without mentioning any o2 payments.

missmoo1

I See I am among many, £30, O2 prepay today! (10/09/09) what I am more concerned about is the lack of interest by O2 and more the banks, I bank with Barclays and while I have been more than happy with the day to day stuff the merry dance I have been on to sort it all out is unacceptable, as mentioned by another above, ages to get through, no urgency when you do. Please MSE kick some rears and do your thing!

Platty182

Woah. Can't believe how many people this is happening too. Must be thousands more out there.

Yes this has happened to me too. I checked my online statement yesterday and there it is on 29 Aug 2009 a debit for 02 prepay slough....

Now I do have my phone with O2 but thats a contract and is direct debit and I also have my broadband with O2 but that is a direct debit. So at first I thought it was something to do with those...

But no. I rang O2 first as I was confused as to what it was and to be fair they were very helpful and told me it was fraud and to contact my bank. She gave me her name and said I will need to inform my bank that I've spoken to her and that they have confirmed the transaction was nothing to do with my O2 accounts or me buying top up for anyone else.

So anyway phoned my bank (Natwest) who went through the usual fraud questions and cancelled my card there and then and said they will be sending me forms to fill in and I will get the £30 refunded.

I've been all over my statements for the past few months like a hawk and the O2 one is the only dodgy thing I see. I guess I've been lucky that after the original £30 on 29 Aug nothing else has been taken out by the fraudsters.

I have no idea how someone got my details as I'm very careful. I used a few ATM's around that time but I'm pretty sure none of them were hooked up with any stuff as they are vey busy ATM's in busy areas.... Only other thing I used my card for was at Pizza Hut but that was chip and pin.

Online purchases for the past month have only been with play.com or through Paypal.... I've seen Paypal mentioned a few times on this thread so I'm not sure I'm going to register my new card on there... Don't like the idea of my details being held on a companies server anyway... But what are you to do eh?

Apart from feeling sick that someone got hold of my card details and I have no idea how, the most annoying thing for me is that there is a postal strike/problems going on in London at the moment and I haven't had post all week. So my new card may not get to me for ages and I'm going away on friday! GAHHHHH!

Today I decided to do some Google searching and found countless websites and forums regarding this type of fraud. Some really good info on here cheers MSE. But seriously can't believe how long it's been going on for. Why is it still happening?

So Angry, so so angry.

divadee

mr divadee has just been done. £30 o2 top up.

barclays actually alerted us as a transaction for 1p for vodafone and then £30 for o2 gone through.

they have cancelled the card and forms for us to get the £30 back.

I called o2 and they refused to put me through to the fraud department:rolleyes: they said you just have to do it all through your bank.

only new website i had used (as it was a small savings amount in this account we use for home stuff) was a gardening website called j parker. This card is probably used only once or twice a month and always online (cant remember the pin number lol). and always to reputable sites like m&s play.com. I havent even got a paypal account linked to it.

defo sounds like staff from one company or a bank or something.

Shazzadouglas

This happened to me too a few months ago. I had made 2 separate orders with Dialaphone online and the day after my last order my bank account had been hit with 2 separate charges to vodafone for £30. The mobiles that i had ordered were on vodafone and were both contract so i contacted vodafone and told them that i didn,t have a pay as you go vodafone handset and that the charges were definately not made by me. The guy was very helpful and said that it was 2 separate transactions credited to 2 separate mobile numbers and he gave me the last few digits and said that the phones that had been credited were away down the bottom of England (I live in central scotland).

To cut a long story short, i called my bank and informed them of the transactions....had to cancel my card too. Now Dialaphone was the only site that i had used my card on and gave all my details to so i also phoned them up and went nuts. The lady said that the website was a secure website so she could`t understand how my details had been hacked but since the last transaction on my bank account happened around 5pm on the day and i had used that site to order the phone a few hours previous to me it was glaringly obvious that someone at dialphone had been a thieving pig with my details....cant prove it but i,m not going to use their site again.

rb10

I have read through a few pages of this thread, and have found it very interesting. So many people are so quick to accuse companies, banks, or websites, for allowing their card details to be passed to fraudsters.

This is, in general, not the way it works. Large sites (e.g. Paypal) do their own payment processing, and smaller sites subcontract this out to someone like Worldpay. All these organisations have to be so very careful with our card details, as the amount of fines and worldwide reputational damage would be crippling to their business. I do not believe that these companies have anything to do with these fraud cases.

All these cases of PAYG mobile top-up fraud happen online. That indicates that a 'clone' of the card doesn't exist. So the fraud probably doesn't originate from an ATM, because a device on the ATM, along with 'shoulder-surfing', would enable the fraudster to create a clone, and this, along with your PIN, could be used for ATM withdrawals.

Instead, all that they have is your 16 digit card number, your three digit security code, and your expiry date. With a powerful enough computer, they can just create millions of different possibilities. Each of these is used for a small 'authorisation' transaction, typically for about 1p. (This normally doesn't show up on your statement, but you may notice your available balance decrease by this amount for a few days where one of these has occured.) After they get a successful one, they'll put through a 'real' transaction, for a low value. This is where you see the mobile top-up or cinema ticket.

There is nothing that we can do to stop this at the present time (without advances in technology), apart from being vigilant ourselves (so that we notice the transactions quickly and can stop our cards) and hoping that the banks do the same (e.g. Halifax phoned me to warn me as soon as my card number was used fraudulently; I think Egg do the same). And don't try to shift the blame onto random websites/ATMs that you've used recently, chances are, they don't deserve it. (Although there will always be the odd exception, I appreciate that!).

kinglouie2

Seems that i too have been the target of this Scam.

2 transactions for £15 made on the 17th of September to 02(UK) Prepay, led me to this forum after cancelling by Visa.

In reference to the other posts i have filled out the watchdog form. Just a bit of history. I have been buying on ebay for the past 18 months and had no problems. Last week i listed something for sale and have had this issue. It could well be paypal (ebay) as if the item is listed as PICKUP then they can get your address quite easily (i beleive).

Having said that i have never been very good at shredding documents and letters from the bank and stuff. In a way i am glad that it has happened to me this way as it is a very small amount that has been taken and it will make me a lot more concious in the future.

Don't really see the point in ringing 02, yes they could get the phone bared but then they are just going to use another stolen phone that they have either obtained or stolen first hand and thus encouraging further theft of mobiles.

Ho Hum - on with my day

poppie123

Happened to me today.:mad:

Logged onto my Barclays account to see two £15 transactions for 02 (UK) LTD PREPAY. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before.

Barclays have cancelled my debit card and are sending me the forms to fill in. They said they would investigate and i should get the money back.

Should, what do they mean by should. Surely they must be aware of this happening, i have googled it and found that there are loads of people this is happening to. I bloody hope i get it back.
Oh and to top it all the man i was speaking to was trying to convince me to switch to a current account plus, God do they never give up!

It's so annoying.

2108

Registered for this thread really.

The same happened to me on the 16th at 13:04, 1 x £30 for O2 PREPAY, SLOUGH
Followed up a few days later by a purchase for £14.49 from STOLLI CLOTHING, BRANDNINCH

Luckily I noticed this and cancelled my card right away before they could get away with a bigger purchase. Both transactions have been reported to my bank, new card received and declaration forms are on the way for me to sign so they can start their investigation.

What's worrying is that they were able to follow up the "test" transaction with another purchase from a site which uses WorldPay as their payment method (does not state whether it implements mastercard securecode or verified by visa security methods) and im pretty sure one of the steps to authorise a transaction would be to provide the correct billing address and full cardholder name associated with the card? I am usually very careful when it comes to security and shred all my letters before throwing them out. It's strange how they were able to get so many details. :mad: