BBC Watchdod: Banks freezing out innocent customers and blacklisting them

opinions4u

pqrdef wrote: »

In what circumstances? If somebody is suspected of something, the only proper course of action is to investigate quickly and resolve the matter one way or the other. You can't just flag somebody as a suspect and then forever treat them as if they did it without ever finding any further evidence.

It's a fair old time since I've been part of it, but from memory CIFAS records include both fraudsters and victims of fraud - triggering manual intervention in underwriting decisions.

Fraud doesn't always result in prosecution. The DPA gives innocent consumers protection against incorrect fraud records being held on CIFAS. But there's nothing illegal or wrong about holding accurate records - even without prosecution.

JuicyJesus

CKhalvashi wrote: »

I also see that the opportunity in the non-AML case I gave hasn't been defended, and this has been noted in my own mind.

CK

That's because it's indefensible (from what you've posted). But then we don't know the full story. And what you posted was a bit jumbled.

However it has nothing to do with the matter at hand. A bank doing something wrong does not extrapolate to anything banks do being wrong.

The_pc_tech

While the spirit of the law is to shut down any drug dealers/organised crime syndicates and seize their ill gotten gains the problem is that these individuals/organisations are of course not going to be honest about their illegal activities as of course the bank would (and should) tip off the authorities so it all comes down to analysis of behaviour performed either by a human being or perhaps neural network based analysis software that 'learns' patterns and makes such decisions based on the bank's business rules.

I certainly agree though there needs to be an independent third party that could review information that the bank is not permitted to divulge to the customer and either direct the bank to unfreeze the account or tell the customer that the bank has a legitimate grounds to freeze the account without specifying the reason why,

MoneySaverLog

If I was to use a VPN connection to protect my identity online would this cause anti-fraud checks with the banks if they see me logging in with a different Point Of Presence other than the UK?

Considering these guys: http://torguard.net

JuicyJesus

MoneySaverLog wrote: »

If I was to use a VPN connection to protect my identity online would this cause anti-fraud checks with the banks if they see me logging in with a different Point Of Presence other than the UK?

Considering these guys: http://torguard.net

I very much doubt it. However I would be loathe to use Tor or any third party VPN to access important financial information.

innovate

Could very well be the case. If they see you logging in one minute from the UK, two hours later from somewhere in Hungary, and next day in the US, they (/their systems) may very well conclude that it might not be you using your account. If the IP addresses your access uses are more unusual (could be anywhere in the world with Tor), you might get blocked repeatedly.

Some websites also completely block proxies (which tor essentially is). Don't know whether banks do that, I have never used any proxy to access any bank. However, they may well do so since they, in cooperation with the ISP, would generally want to be able to trace the user. And so would you, probably, if someone hacked into your account and stole your money.

Another thing to think about is security - - in some cases there is no encryption, so your entire traffic (incl login information) gets sent in clear text.

MoneySaverLog

This was what I was thinking with regards to changing the POP too often, or continuously using one outside the UK.

I believe encryption wise it's 128bit. So more than adequate protection there.

Sensory

As an example, PayPal explicitly forbids logging in through any VPN or proxy service.

innovate wrote: »

Another thing to think about is security - - in some cases there is no encryption, so your entire traffic (incl login information) gets sent in clear text.

Which online banking service doesn't support encryption?

innovate

Sensory wrote: »

Which online banking service doesn't support encryption?

I wasn't talking about online banking, but about proxies. I don't know the technical ins and outs but understand that some proxies are sending even traffic from https pages in unencrypted form.

The_pc_tech

I suspect the bank might smell a rat if they see logins from a foreign IP constantly or if you have registered as living abroad but are using a VPN service that routes via London thus presenting a UK IP.