i Tunes fraud

Mismanagement

Hi All
I fell victim to the infamous itunes fraud today and to my horror and discovered that my bank account had been debited to the tune of nearly £700.00 by someone using my debit card details.
I hadnt heard of this scam until it happened to me but seems it has been going on for years. Apple dont seem to be able to stop it.

Anyway contacted my bank (HSBC) to report the fraud and they said it wasnt fraud as I did have an itune account. (I think I downloaded a tune for 99p for my son last year sometime!) This makes it a dispute.
My question to everyone is , as a 'dispute,' am I still liable to be refunded under their fraudulent activity policy? They said they would temporarily refund the monies in about 5 days (great now in overdraft and have no access to any funds), but ,that they witheld the right to take it back if i tunes could prove it was a genuine series of transactions. I have since read all sorts of stuff on the internet, some saying the money isnt even really going to itunes (dont know how true that it) and I am worried that if my computer has been hacked in some way it might look like it has gone to my ip address only to really being going elsewhere!( seems like science fiction to me but have read that very clever hackers can take control of your computer).
The bank told me that itunes is not a secure site :eek: and the first question they asked was if I used Amazon!
Will the bank refund this money on a permanent basis?
Any advice welcome

FionaMcG

I don't have any solution, but I've had the same problem. I managed to catch it and cancel the card, but the fraudster then went on to spend about $40, which my card company declined, so I now "owe" iTunes the $40. They accept it is fraud, but want me to pay the balance to clear the account, which they will then refund. I think this is outrageous, especially as it means adding my new card to the account, leaving me open to more fraud. (At the moment, my account is safe as the registered card has been cancelled.)
I feel like walking away, but have been advised that the debt might follow me.

jonesMUFCforever

FionaMcG wrote: »

I don't have any solution, but I've had the same problem. I managed to catch it and cancel the card, but the fraudster then went on to spend about $40, which my card company declined, so I now "owe" iTunes the $40. They accept it is fraud, but want me to pay the balance to clear the account, which they will then refund. I think this is outrageous, especially as it means adding my new card to the account, leaving me open to more fraud. (At the moment, my account is safe as the registered card has been cancelled.)
I feel like walking away, but have been advised that the debt might follow me.

Offer to send them a cheque!

AG_McIntyre

I too fell victim last Saturday(17th April) to itunes fraud! I am so livid and spent ages trying to find a suitable number to call, after firstly contacting the bank to cancel the debit card and report the fraud! There were 9 transactions totally over £200 and by cancelling after spotting those I thought it was contained but no! A further 3 transactions happened later that day and have subsequently been debited from my account - 12 transactions totalling over £300! Needless to say Royal Bank of Scotland's fraud team told me that Apple were very difficult to deal with and refused to deal directly with financial institutions. The support team from Apple told me to get my bank's fraud dept to speak to Apple's fraud department because they didn't deal directly with individual customers!!! The person from the bank's fraud team advised me to contact Citizen's Advice and Trading Standards and that was all! No action could be taken by them! I called my branch in Scotland who said that was unacceptable and to speak again to the fraud department! I'm waiting on a phone call to get a different number! I have an appointment with Citizen's advice this evening ! FIZZZZZZing!!!!!!!!!

Spooneroonie

Sorry to dredge up what is clearly a really unhappy situation, but what is the iTunes fraud? And does anyone have any advice as to how to protect against it?

Ayeshalush

This also happened to me but with my credit card rather than a debit card. After a number of calls my credit card eventually agreed that the transactions were fraudulent and refunded me.

iTunes were not interested and said that there policy states that they are not responsible for fraudulent transactions if you're account is hacked!!!

The only way that I know of to protect yourself (or at least try to ) is to remove your payment details from your iTunes account after every transaction.

I, however, will never use iTunes again as I think their policies and attitudes stink. I also will never nuy another Apple product whwich is a pain as I don't think that you can beat iPod;s but it is a price I'm willing to pay.

Abbafan1972

How did they get your details?

bobmanuk

Safest way to avoid the iTunes scams is never to put credit or debit card details into your iTunes account. They are not needed you can use iTunes gift cards instead. I buy them on ebay, quicker than going to get them in the shops because the sellers will email the codes to you straight away. A word of caution tho, do use a seller with a good reputation ie Top Rated, Power Seller, lots of good feedback etc cos there are otherwise scams waiting for you there as well. I've found a very reliable seller and stick to him.
Good luck!
Bob

bvg_2

Fascinating to find that I'm not the only person that this has happened to. I had a receipt emailed to me this evening from iTunes for 4 purchases totalling £4.16. I often get phishing emails and thought that this was probably one too, but it looked just too genuine. So I rang Barclaycard who confirmed that the amount was being processed. I immediately cancelled the card, but I cannot report it as fraud apparently and can only open a dispute. However, I can't do this until the money has been paid to whoever it is who has scammed it - I can't stop them paying it!

I don't really understand who gets what out of this, because I appear to have bought 4 cameras for £4.16, which presumably can't be right. Unless it's that once they find the card works, they use it elsewhere for large amounts.

I last used my iTunes account 18 months ago. I found it impossible to find an active phone number or any links on iTunes to help and ended up ringing USA as their phone operators were still working.

I consider myself pretty savvy about card fraud etc but I'm puzzled how they got all my details. I assume that iTunes' security has been compromised, although I'm sure they wouldn't admit it.

I tend to agree with the posts saying don't give them your credit card details. It would be good to get some media interest in all of this though. It'd be very interesting if anyone has more info on this scam or any ideas about publicising it further.

Ayeshalush

bvg wrote: »

It would be good to get some media interest in all of this though. It'd be very interesting if anyone has more info on this scam or any ideas about publicising it further.

I received a private message from a journalist for the Times yesterday asking me to contact them about iTunes fraud. I am very tempted as I think iTunes customer support is abysmal in these circumstances, however I was lucky in that my credit card company was sympathetic and regarded it as fraud (although it did take 3 phone calls and £121 of iTunes transactions). Has anyone else had a message from this journalist?

HannahIOW

Hi how do I remove my card details from itunes please? And how do you use the itunes cards instead? I don't have itunes on my computer anymore so would need to do this through my iphone. Thanks