Apple wallet hack

superbmum

My son (21) late last night noticed three unusual payments from two separate bank accounts (Santander and HSBC). Santander (three transactions £0.99, and 2 x £49.99) has told him it's from his Apple wallet - he's a money-conscious student so is very good at knowing what he's spent and is adamant he has not made those payments and the organisation the payments have gone to is just a series of letters, no way to identify who it is.

Santander offered him two options - cancel the card and get a replacement, or they could blacklist his Apple wallet which means he'd never be able to use Apple wallet again.  I advised him to do the first option as I have no idea the effects on his future financial stability if he blacklists his Apple wallet. Santander told him he won't get his money back, whichever he chooses to do.

Does anyone have any experience or even understand how this could happen and what he can do in future please?

He's yet to talk to HSBC as he was only left with a web chat option but that was one amount (I think) of £102.

nyermen

Hopefully someone more knowledeable will come along, however "from his apple wallet" suggests apple pay, which is supposed to be restricted.  Has anyone had access to his device(s)?   

ps. Those transaction values sound like app store "in app purchase" payments but that might just be coincidence?

daveyjp

Provide recipient details and you may get further info about what the payments are for.

DullGreyGuy

99p transactions sound like an in app purchase, not much else you can get for that price these days!

If he goes to Settings -> Taps his name at the top -> Media & Purchases -> Purchase History  that will show what has been spent in any in app purchases or subscriptions.

What are the merchant names/"series of letters"? It's unlikely you are the first to ever buy something then not recognise the name so its often possible to find others who were equally confused and then worked it out. 

superbmum

From the Santander account the recipient was bndmdm. Will find out the recipient from the HSBC account and post on here.

Thank you for the help so far.

Brie

99p sounds like a try out for a possible scam to me.  Yes it could be for an in app purchase but it also tells the purchaser that they have legitimate bank details.  

superbmum

He has a subscription I with both, iCloud is 99p a month and Apple Music is £10.99 and he recognises them when they come out.

AstonSmith

If it's from Apple Pay, why did they offer to cancel and replace the physical card? Wouldn't the digital one in the Apple wallet remain?

There are two places to look:

1 Try visiting this Apple link: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/118212 and follow the instructions, it should reveal a list of the purchases made.

2 Open the Wallet app, click on the Santander card, and then look at the purchase history.

danco

A quick web check reveals bndmdm appears scammy. You could go to the site bndmdm.com and see for yourself.

It may well be that he was caught out by the same kind of scam a friend had on her debit card (not through Apple wallet).

It's not uncommon for anyone accepting a free gift to be asked for card details, perhaps for postage on an item. Buried deep in the terms and conditions is a clause saying that the card details may be passed on to partners, and subscribing you to one of the partners. The small charge is to see if you notice what's going on, and the large charge is the actual charge. If the site is even semi-legitimate, they should accept a cancellation request. That worked for several subscriptions my friend was not aware of, and she even got a refund of the most recent payment. But for a couple of very questionable sites, although they gave instructions on how to cancel, they did not confirm the cancellation, and appear to be still attempting to claim money. I have advised her to cancel the card.

I think it highly unlikely that his Apple wallet had been hacked, but quite possible that he was scammed into a subscription without knowing it.

I make it a rule that if I try accepting a free offer, I don't submit the application but close the window as soon as they ask for card details. I suppose it is possible that some legitimate purchase could give rise to these problems, but I hope this won't happen.

DullGreyGuy

danco said:

A quick web check reveals bndmdm appears scammy. You could go to the site bndmdm.com and see for yourself.

The site itself claims to be the finance part of a dating website, which could make sense as not everyone would want dating.com to appear on their card statement, especially if it's their partner's statement. Claims to be run by a UK web dev company, it, this site etc were all set up about the same time last year.

Ergates

Brie said:

99p sounds like a try out for a possible scam to me.  Yes it could be for an in app purchase but it also tells the purchaser that they have legitimate bank details.  

*Scams* don't generally try out with 99p first.