First a computer crash and now ... (1 Viewer)

CarversDog

CarversDog

RIP
... bank fraud, ladies and gents, lovely bank fraud! Yeppers.

I logged onto my WaMu account online this morning to discover that someone, some-fucking-how, got ahold of my ATM number and PIN and went on a wild spree at two ATMs in Las Vegas. All three transactions posted this morning for a grand total of $1,200, seriously overdrafting my checking accout over the allowable limit.

I cannot see specifically when the transactions were made but there two transactions at an ATM at 2250 E. Tropicana Avenue in the amount of $200.00 and $500.00 and a third ATM transaction at an ATM at 2015 W. Craig Road in North Las Vegas also in the amount of $500.00.

A fraud claim was filed at 1:30 this afternoon and I have to next file a police report. The good news (as if!) is that whoever the fuck did this got greedy; by stealing over $1,000 from me they crossed the line into felonious fraud and the investigators assigned to my case at WaMu, I was assured a short while ago, will be vigorously investigating this incident.

WaMu, believe it or not, has been bending over backwards to help me since this has created a severe financial hardship but what they cannot answer for me is how the hell I am supposed to survive for the next 2 to 5 days, which is how long it will take them to reverse the transactions and the OD fees.

Happy Thanksgiving to me ... I am totally screwed.

(And no ... absolutely no one has access to my ATM card or my PIN, so I have no goddamn idea how this happened).

Fuck.
 
Me too. Sorry to hear about your week.

Identity theft happened to me last year. I was traveling through Colorado and got a call from my bank asking me if I was in Vietnam. Apparently someone there got my credit card number and tried to buy Viagra online.

Somehow my bank noticed that purchasing Viagra online from an IP address in Vietnam was out of character for me (believe it or not) and they cancelled the card immediately. Usually the banks are pretty good with this stuff. I hope they take care of you and catch the people who did this.
 
I just wish it wasn't going to take 2-5 business days to reverse this. They will clearly see by studying my banking history that I never, ever have taken that amount of cash from an ATM and until they see that, I'm left with nuthin' to live on until they reverse it. Finanical crimes are huge in LV. There are 11 detectives assigned to the financial crimes unit in the LVPD in my community (Summerlin/Sun City) alone.
 
CarversDog said:
I hope they catch the fuckers.
Click to expand...

Indeed - and cut off their balls too!
And to add insult to injury you have to go penniless for a couple of days too. I think your bank should've given you some of your own (!) money to help you get through until they've reversed the situation. They could've at least have given you a small loan, but I guess banks only bend over backwards to help people up to a certain point. Anyway, I hope you pull through until the situation is normalized.

Everybody tells me to get an internet bank account so I can pay my bills from home, but hearing about your bad luck I'm getting second thoughts!
 
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Oh sure, if I was CitiGroup or any other hard-hit financial institution, the government would've bailed me right the fuck out. But I'm a small businessman and an independent contractor so, hey, I'm on my own. That's the way we do things in the good ol' US of A. Free enterprise means "sink or swim" if you're not a big fish.
 
That's right! The fat cats and their puppets, the politicians, takes care of themselves, while the rest of us can finance their follies and if something bad happens to us we'll be lucky to get a food stamp. Oh, what a wonderful world...
 
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as far as securing your online transactions, someone recommended this to me (for firefox browsers):

http://noscript.net/

i have don't really understand it, as i'm computer-retarded, but it's supposedly 'really great'. someone else here probably knows more about how it works than i do.
 
liberty and justice for all...who can afford it,

I hope that fucking bastard chokes to death,

Carvers Dog,

I Hope you get your money back, ASAP, also I suggest that you review your account transactions for more than 2 months backwards, in most of the cases the fucking rat will try to buy something cheap just to check if a card has been reported lost or something; they will usually but like a coffee or so at a McCrap, were the clerk does not ask for an ID.
 
Well shit, if that isn't the ol' one two punch. That sucks balls man. Best of luck straightening it out in the next couple of days.

And if they catch the guys, a swift kick to the jewels should make them think twice about doing it again. Vegas has a lot of seedy back alleys (or did the "modernize" the all out?). Just sayin'.
 
I heard of another scam going around, here it is:


Anyone may print checks on the internet.
They get a hold of one of your checks
Go to one of those internet check printing companies
Put fake person info on it - address, name
Print up the fake checks with your account number:

BlaMMo! Instant money.

Be careful.
 
Same thing happened to a friend of mine, FL. He wrote a check on his business account to a client, the client made a copy of the check sans the PAY TO THE ORDER OF line filled in, forged his sig, and made multiple copies, and passed bad paper on his account to the tune of something like $13,000 before he got wise and notified authorities.

***

Yes, LTS, these SOB's better hope that the cops discover who they are before I do. I know where a lot of those dark alleys in LV are.

***

Rubyred, I think this happened as a result of using an ATM that was a non-commercial-bank ATM.

***

Stickpin, what can I say? When you're right, you're right. And you're right.

Good news, though ... as of this eve, WaMu has done a temporary reversal and erased all OD's until the investigation is complete. I still have to fill out an affidavit, mail that back in and ... oh, yeah, they cut off my ATM and credit card and I won't be issued a new one for another 7-10 days.
 
This is old news, it's been going on since the internet started.

It's no coincidence that you had computer problems, then this. Your Wamu info was probably swiped by a keylogger and once they got into your Wamu account they could see the electronic versions of the checks, take the account and routing numbers and load up a dummy card to work at any ATM. Simple, simple, simple, unfortunately.

The weak link here isn't Wamu or Chase or the ATM - it's your computer. The virus, worm, malware or rootkit got in there, and once that happens you're fucked. If it was a rootkit, you're still fucked, even after an O/S re-install...sorry to say.

I pay all my bills and do all my banking on line, but I use this USB drive to store everything. It's stupid expensive, but worth it.

I keep my books in progress on there too. Because, you know, they are so valuable!

But really, it's pretty easy to pick up malware thes days. It should be standard procedure to scan your box for crap every few days. I use Uniblue Spy Eraser and Registry Booster, but that's just me. This is starting to read like an advertsement...
 
I understand all you are saying, MJP, and I accept that it's a strange "coincidence" that this event coincided with my computer issues but doesn't the fact that the theft was local, here in Las Vegas, indicate that the theft occurred in another arena?
 
CarversDog, sorry to hear of your troubles, God, what a royal pain in the ass! The banks seem to try a bit harder now to help their clients in these situations, but they certainly are not speedy about it.
I had a guy steal my visa/mac card and go to Wal-Mart at 4am on a Sunday Mornin' and buy $800.00 worth of stereo equipment. There were so many checks bouncing after that, you had to cover your eyes! No, they didn't get the asshole.
GoodLuck, try to have paitence(as hard as that can be), all will work out. CRB:)
 
Shit, CarversDog, that really sucks. I hope it turns out ok for you somehow.

mjp said:
I pay all my bills and do all my banking on line, but I use this USB drive to store everything. It's stupid expensive, but worth it.
Click to expand...

Now that's an interesting little gadget. It sure beats simply using TrueCrypt.
 
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CarversDog said:
I understand all you are saying, MJP, and I accept that it's a strange "coincidence" that this event coincided with my computer issues but doesn't the fact that the theft was local, here in Las Vegas, indicate that the theft occurred in another arena?
Click to expand...
Hmm, well, it being local could mean that someone you handed your card to at a store or restaurant used a card reader to copy your info. They don't have to take the card out of your sight, they can attach the reader to the legit swiping unit right there next to the cash register and most people would not notice it. They caught a guy recently who attached a small card reader to an ATM! He also had installed a camera to catch people entering the PIN numbers.

That kind of physical theft of the card info is pretty common too (by stores and restaurants, not by ATM ;)), but they don't get your PIN off the magnetic stripe - not in a readable form anyway - so the dummy ATM card they used, added to your computer problems lead me to believe that your computer was the source.

Doesn't really matter either way though, does it? It's fucked any way you slice it, and I understand wanting to gut the fucker who did it.
 
CRBSMILE said:
CarversDog, sorry to hear of your troubles, .... ..............................................................(Snip..)....
I had a guy steal my visa/mac card and go to Wal-Mart at 4am on a Sunday Mornin' and buy $800.00 worth of stereo equipment. ..........................................................................................
GoodLuck, try to have paitence(as hard as that can be), all will work out. CRB:)
Click to expand...

There are so many cameras in Wal Mart why didn't they check for a picture of the person? Wal Mart and other retailers are required to check I.D. so they can be held liable too.

C-dog, do you use Internet Explorer or Firefox?
 
Yeah. Well there was video, but it had been taped over so many times that you couldn't really make a positive ID. It took my old man rolling in there with a cop for Wally to even look at the tape. As for ID, they did not ask(but try to buy a pack of smokes, I've seen them card 50year old men for smokes!), the only requirement as ID is a signed card. Stupid, but very true, and basically meaningless now, when most retailers have you swipe your own card anyway. Stolen/lost cards are free game, pretty much. CRB:)
 
mjp said:
They caught a guy recently who attached a small card reader to an ATM! He also had installed a camera to catch people entering the PIN numbers.
Click to expand...
This technique has been used in Europe for quite some years now. They attach a skimmer to the ATM and a small camera to film the pin-code being typed in. They can also just look over your shoulder. You should always cover the hand typing the code.

MJP: I really don't see how they can get the pin-code and magnetic stripe info from the internet-bank. Also: don't American internet banks have security-code whatchamacallit generators? For every transaction you have to enter a separate security code which is generated one time in the whatchamacallit and not stored on the computer.

My guess is a local ATM skimmer-scam.

But then again there's that bit about the computer crashing....
 
CarversDog said:
I logged onto my WaMu account online this morning to discover that someone, some-fucking-how, got ahold of my ATM number and PIN and went on a wild spree at two ATMs in Las Vegas.

(And no ... absolutely no one has access to my ATM card or my PIN, so I have no goddamn idea how this happened).
Click to expand...

Just curious, R. Is your card an ATM/Debit card?
By that I mean does it also have a credit card,
Visa/MasterCard, attached to it?

Just curious.
 
Kurt, I use IE on our home/business computer and Lela uses Mozilla when she's on the 'puter.
******
Erik, I think the computer crash is just a fucked up coincidence; somtimes bad things come in waves. I know they usually do with me (and conversely, good news comes in waves ... it's a yin-yang kinda thing). I, too, believe it was a card scanner scam at the local Speedee Mart I frequent for beer and smokes.
*******
Yes, FL, it's a debit/credit card
 
Yes, FL, they used it at two WaMu ATMs in Las Vegas on the other side of town (North LV). One ATM transaction for $200 (the test transaction) and then moments later they withdrew $500 from my account at the same ATM; they then traveled a few miles away to Craig Avenue and struck at another WaMu ATM for an additional $500.00.

Just got back from filing the police report with Las Vegas Metro, incidentally. Is it just me or does anyone else get nervous when police begin running your DL and personal info? Hell, I have nothing to be afraid of but there's always that Kafka-esque possibility that someone has stolen your identity and has bench warrants out under your name.
 
Erik said:
MJP: I really don't see how they can get the pin-code and magnetic stripe info from the internet-bank.
Click to expand...
They couldn't. But if your bank stores images of your canceled checks online and someone gets into your account, they can empty it using the account number and routing number from the checks. Different approach, same end result.
 

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