Angry!!!!

A credit freeze with all 3 credit bureaus might help.

pay attention to your emails you open and start filtering spam better.

Pay closer attention to the websites you go to.

My parents have a retirement job of doing nothing but removing virus' and trojans from computers.

The crap we see and the excuses we hear for why their computers are a mess befuddles us all the time. Even from the older generation. Older lady couldn't understand all the porn in their email. Guess where her hubby was spending time. And they were in their 80's.

Wow, I'm surprised they didn't catch it. I'd call them and tell them you want to set up fraud alerts - they can alert you by email or text and you can specify that you want them to text between 9 a.m. and 10 p.m. only. Like I mentioned before, I also get text and email when my CC is charged for more than $100.

https://www.usaa.com/inet/pages/secu...i_auth_nav_sec

That's a great idea! I'll for sure do that as soon as i calm down enough to hold a conversation! Thanks,wade

I have my paypal set up as a business account and have the debit card.
I only put money in when I have to pay for something and any money coming to me gets pulled.
maintain 1 dollar ballance more or less.
I find it the easy way to avoid over drafts.
Unless you set up your bank account for back up funding.

The GF is much better at avoiding that so her account is setup with the card being backed up and maintain a $1 balance also.

As you noted they can be very anal about things and its the main reason I use them.
had many issues with folks recharging when they where not suppose to as in I stopped an auto pay/recurring payment type thing.
Easy to reverse it.
Better yet if my accounts not holding enough it gets stopped there with no repercussion or extra foot work to correct.

Recently the Michigan lotto started a new thing called WON card.
I do not play a lot of lotto but some.
any prizes under 600 go right on your card.
Wondering what this has to do with anything here.
Cheapest prepay for any one in Michigan.
I can charge it at any lotto retailer in Michigan for free, card was free,and I can use it anywhere discover accepted for free.
I can either buy 1 ticket a month or pay a 2 dollar maintaince fee to continue using it.
no other prepay is this advantageous.

"edited" I THOUGHT I COULD USE THE WON CARD AS A BACKUP FUNDING ON MY PPDC BUT IT APPEARS THE ONLY OPTIONS ARE BANKACCOUNT OR PP LINE OF CREDIT.

So between the two I have Mastercard or discovery for electronic tender if need be and the PP gives me a bulldog in the corner if the transaction not honorable!

Grannies gone wild?

Before letting anyone have the CC memorize and then remove the 3 digits from the back of the card. After doing this I have not had any issues at restaurants. For all online purchases I use PayPal.

__________________
Agmantoo
If they can do it,
you know you can!

Get a e use card number from your bank with the amount you need on it. Use it and it is dead.

I keep none of my pass words on the puter. I always type them in.

I love my cardless life. It is much cheaper for one thing.

A program in my puter rates every password.

1) Unless it is an online only retailer then it will be the same database as the brick&mortar stores.
2) Brick&mortar stores have had huge problems with POS (Point of Sale) terminals being abused or compromise. Also a problem with employees (or others) using skimmers, taking pictures of cards, etc.
3)Many smaller retailers have compliance & security issues
4) If this is of interest to you read the Verizon Breach Investigation Report (VBIR) for a better understanding of data breaches. http://www.verizonenterprise.com/DBIR/2013/
5) avoid debit cards which link to a checking account or similar.
6) This problem is so rampant that credit card dumps are running about $6/megabyte. Think about how much card info with associated data (name, address, expiration, etc.) would be in a megabyte of data.
7) Working an investigation on something like this can be incredibly time consuming.
8) Most local law enforcement jurisdictions simply don't have the required skillsets or resources to carry out a successful investigation and support a successful criminal prosecution.
9) You SHOULD file a criminal complaint. If nothing else it provides information that may be useful if linked to another investigation at a later point.

We live in interesting times.

Mike

Since this post has had so many good replies I would like to add one more point that I didn't think about until it happened. It may be of interest or help you in some small way.
The first time I got hack I jumped through all the hoops,one of which was filing with the indiana state police. So happens the officer who took my call was a sgt. that I knew.After a few days of getting everything together to send to walmart.com,my last acts were to get all the filing numbers from everyone and "fax" it to them. The sgt. happened to be working on the saturday night that I finnaly got it all together so I'm standing there,finnaly done and ask " hey, think you could fax this in for me? They might actually pay some attention to it if it's comming from you guys instead of me!". His imediate response was " NO WAY! A PLACE LIKE THIS<AND ON A WEEKEND.GOD ONLY KNOWS HOW MANY PEOPLE WOULD HAVE ACCESS TO IT!"
Hope this helps someone.Wade

I am a USAA user too. I cannot tell you how many times we've had our CC info stolen. However, I've always had a real easy time dealing with it through USAA.

What is the worst, however, is when a "conspicuous transaction" is made and they immediately freeze my credit cards before we know!

We've narrowed most issues down to having used our credit cards in different countries. We no longer use credit cards online when in another country - in fact, mostly it's all cash transactions!

Once, my husband used his card online when he was in a hotel in Guam. The next day we had a charge (which was immediately stopped by USAA) for like 600$ for in-game gold on that World of Warcraft game.

If you're continuously having these problems, try narrowing down when/where it takes place. Could be (we've had it happen once) that someone who took your credit card info at a store kept the information and used it later.

As far as emails are concerned... there are a few ways to keep it safe.

1. Never use the same passwords on any sites. So your email, USAA account, Forums, Facebook, whatever else you use... they should ALL be different. If someone figures out your password on an unsecure (not updated forums have a looooot of security problems) forum, and sees your email, they will most likely try and put two-and-two together.

2. Use a combination of upper-case, lower-case, numbers and symbols (Dog-treeH4t2). MOST times when accounts are hacked, people use a password cracker. Basically what it is, is a program that will include a text file, inside the file is a list of words and it will cycle through thousands of combinations until it gains access. (1, 11, 12...2, 21, 22) Never use words in the password that are known to the public (For example, if you fill out a profile and it asks for your favorite food, you're better off never answering this question because it often used for security questions, etc. Also, don't include it as a password since others know it!)

3. Don't click links if you don't know who they are from! If you get an email from your bank, or your paypal account that claims that you need to update a password, there has been a security breach, or just saying you have a pending survey, ALWAYS type in the URL to the website yourself. Spoof links gather so much information, the websites look the same, you'd never realize it until it was too late. AND, they often include spyware, malware or viruses to gather more information from your computer.

4. Use a fake, or secondary email to sign up for unimportant things. My personal email address is used for friends, family, and things I trust. I have a backup email, that I honestly rarely ever check, that I use to sign up for other websites, forums, etc.

Sorry if it's too long to read! But, I hope ya do. And I hope you are able to stop running into these instances of fraud. I know how frustrating it is. The digital age surely sucks.

katschultz-Good read. Thanks!I guess the age of being naive is over. I'm just going to have to"wise up!"Thanks again,Wade

Sorry you got hit! It burns me up too.

Mine is a debit card that I use like a credit card. I was hacked twice in one year a few years ago. Once was at an unfamiliar convenience store gas pump. They charged over $1500 worth of sporting goods and expensive women's clothes before my CC holder caught it. I got it all refunded, but it took a litlte while and was inconvenient waiting to get the new one in the mail.

The other time, we never were sure but think it was through a PayPal/eBay merchant. They only got about $500 that time, but again since I use it as a credit card, I was fully covered.

I knew to look for the padlock, but at some point someone told me one way you can tell if it's a secure site also is the web address. If it starts with http:// it's NOT secure, but if it starts with https:// it IS secure.

I don't know for sure if that's true, but twice I started to order something from stores that had a padlock but didn't have the (s) in the address...and later discovered lots of people were getting ripped off after using those sites, so I don't know if the padlock is a sure thing either. Maybe they can fake that somehow.

Anyway, I started watching for both of those things and if anything didn't "feel" right to me I stayed away. It's been almost three years since I was last hacked, and I shop online a LOT, lol. I live 40 miles outside of town, and it's much easier and cost and time effective. I only go to town once or occasionally twice a month, and I spend less than $50 a month on gas, so shopping online is very important to me.

Callie-thanks! More good info!Wade

yep type credit card generator in youtube to see how they do that.

Believe it or not they are doing a great job to try to protect you, the online merchant are sometimes if not all the times the lousy one.

For those of you who trust SSL/"the lock symbol", You would do well to go to https://www.ssllabs.com/ and test the SSL site you are thinking about gicing your info or credit card to.

It is surprising how many sites use weak ciphers or are subject to various attacks. As far as SSL, all versions (including SSL3) have issues. Both TLS 1.0 and 1.1 have issues as well. TLS 1.2 does not have known issues but good luck finding browser support.

Mike

This is in one the comments?

__________________
Oh my, dishes yet to wash and dry

See My Pictures at
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/0903/arabianknight/