Credit card was jeopardized... now what?

[kaytieeldr]

But with all the information the OP describes sending the Virginia DMV, she doesn't mention "credit card number" or "debit card number" anywhere. Now, that doesn't mean she didn't fax them payment information as well - but it would be otherwise virtually impossible for anyone at the VA DMV to use the OP's credit/debit card. And anyone who did? Wouldn't need all that other personal information anyway.

They're much more likely two separate, coincidentally-timed incidents. Does the OP have anything verifying her information was successfully transmitted to a correct number at the Virginia DMV? Then it's their responsibility to track down the data she submitted. Entirely separate from that, she needs to take the advice provided here regarding the unauthorized charge/s on her card.

 

[plutolover]

I just had my CC (Disney /Visa) compromised as well. And its funny because I did an online transaction with VA DMV. So that makes me wonder as well. Now I also paid for my parking at the airport at one of those Kiosk type things, which is where I really think the breach happened. But, it really does make you wonder.

 

[mommy2allyandaveri]

This just happened to our Disney Visa yesterday. DH and I both tried to get gas yesterday morning and both of our cards were declined. I called and went on line, there were lots of gas, parking and restaurant charges. Some only for $.50. One thing that does bother me is that this started a week ago and they never called me or anything.

 

[UnderTheMistletoe]

Umm, you are out with the lynch mob ready to hang the DMV employee. As others have stated it is more than likely the gas station or ATM that is the source of the compromise. Calm the heck down, notify the credit bureaus and monitor your credit. Put the noose away and quit making unfounded accusations.

 

[pintamino]

My favorite was the UK pornsite that was incurred using my card. They do a <$1 hit a couple of times and then charge you $4.99 a zillion times. Or the trip through the connected Gap/Old Navy/PiperLime/Banana Republic sites... whomever had my card was a shopping perv I guess. LOL

I had my credit card number stolen last year... my mom had something similar happen a couple years prior (we live at different addresses). What the officer who investigated my mom's case told her was that people will frequently use cards to make a few small purchases ($.99 gamefly trial period here, a pair of shoes there) that ultimately give them "points" on one of those less-than-honest sites that they can then redeem for a laptop or something bigger. And they don't care if the card keeps getting charged because it's not their card!

There is nothing wrong with her making them a suspect of high interest since she recently had to send them her personally Identifying information.


She has every right to think that the breach in fact could have came from the VA DMV. It could have also happened through another source as well.
To imply that she is trying to become an executioner is a bit far fetched in MY opinion. Op, I hope that you are able to set up some form of fraud protection for yourself and all that are affected by this breach.

If she didn't send her credit card number to the DMV, it seems really unlikely. This wasn't somebody trying to open a new line of credit in her name -- just somebody using an already established card. If she wants to think it she can, but it was probably just a randomly generated "attempt" (and I'm no friend of the DMV!).


I also recommend identity protection after a compromising event. I've used lifelock in the past. And make sure to watch your activity closely. It sucks, I'm sorry, OP.

 

[UnderTheMistletoe]

Did you "pay at the pump"? A common way for illegal means of obtaining CC numbers is to attach a "skimming" device to the card reader - you will particularly find this type activity at mom-and-pop type service stations (as comopared to a major C-store chain).

Yes and I have been wondering about it since one of the very earlier posters mentioned it. The local gas station is a 7-11 in Orlando. It's really the only one convenient that's here. It's right across the street from an exceedingly secured gated community-- not a bad place to start looking to high limit credit cards. They didn't realize we don't live in that, I guess

 

[UnderTheMistletoe]

Double post... Sorry.

 

[UnderTheMistletoe]

This just happened to our Disney Visa yesterday. DH and I both tried to get gas yesterday morning and both of our cards were declined. I called and went on line, there were lots of gas, parking and restaurant charges. Some only for $.50. One thing that does bother me is that this started a week ago and they never called me or anything.

The bank said that they start with really small charges, usually less than $1, because it doesn't trigger anything; then they step up to under $10; and then, after a few tries, they'll go for the big one. I thought it was interesting... and reminded me that checking once or twice a week isn't enough. You may not even notice something like the initial charges.

They didn't call us either, but apparently had flagged (and then suspended) the account after the first two small charges. Have you been able to sort it out? Are you responsible for any of the charges?

 

[DVCBELLE]

I had this happen to me last year - called Chase - they took the charge off, investigated the matter and sent me new cards. Now we pay for a service that monitors our credit reports and they call us to tell us if there is any new activity on our credit reports.

The credit card company doesn't want you to try to figure out how it happened. They will do any research needed and take care of it if necessary. When the card was used to order online they have info on where that was being shipped. They will trace it if possible and take care of it.

Its not a big deal - it stinks but you actually should be happy knowing that your card watches out for you!!

 

[travelbug]

Umm, you are out with the lynch mob ready to hang the DMV employee. Put the noose away and quit making unfounded accusations.

Gee, I didn't interpret the OP's post this way at all. I think it's kind of natural to have suspicions of when/how a CC number has been stolen, though in many cases it's hard to be sure.

This happened with my Disney Visa a couple months ago. Whoever got the number put through a $1.00 charge, then a $20 charge, and then a $500+ charge with some electronics website -- all within a few hours. I was contacted by the Chase fraud dept. that afternoon. I confirmed that none of the charges were mine, they cancelled the card, and they sent me a new one within days.

Good luck, OP. I hope there are no further problems from this.

 

[marie1203]

It really is not a huge deal. It happens everyday and it had happen at least once to every credit card we own. We never had anyone steal our identity is way more of a hassle for them than just stealing another credit card number. Monitor your credit but not right away give it a week because it takes about a week to show up on your credit report. Honestly when this happen to us we don't do anything else that get new cards numbers. I monitor our credit every 3 months and we never had anything that didn't belong there.

 

[runwad]

Whats that saying? "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure?"

OP I think you're very wise to be taking this seriously and if it turns out to be nothing no big deal, but better to deal with a no big deal situation then something more serious. When this happened to me I called one of the 3 credit reporting agencies, listen to the prompts there will be something about reporting a fraud/stolen card. That one agency will then contact the other two agencies and they will put a fraud alert on your credit for 90 days. In that time no new cards or loans can be taken out in your name without your ok. They will call you if this needs done. Trans Union 877-322-8228 its an automated line so you can call now. It costs nothing.

Another thing you can do is call up the agencies and "freeze" your credit. I think it costs depending on what your state has in place. I'm in OHIO and I think i'd have to pay 10 to 15 per each agency to "freeze" my credit. No new loans or credit could be open in my name while the "freeze" is on. If I decide i want to buy a car and need a loan. I have to contact all three again and pay again the 10 to 15 bucks and unfreeze it so a loan can be issued. At least that is my understanding of how this all works. I've never really used it but something passed in the law in the last so many years so people could freeze their credit. I'm sure someone else will chime in if I've reported in error.

 

[Coll0610]

It's happened to us twice too. Once they had an actual card with our number on it. Both times we found out because a charge was denied, but there were messages at home and work when we got back there. The biggest pain was having no card for a few days, and trying to remember all the things we have automatically charged to the card (DS's lunch account, Blokcbuster, etc).

 

[seashoreCM]

Much of this fraud goes through because the merchant doesn't bother to check the customer's ID. Even though the merchant is out the money or merchandise, it is sometimes cheaper for it in the long run to not be that meticulous in checking ID or even following all the rules of the credit card company.

A porn site won't feel any pain when some of their charges are dishonored by the credit card company after the card number was determined to be used unauthorized.

A satellite TV company won't feel much pain whcn charged back. Now they might erase the entire transaction from their records so they don't pay taxes and royalties.

Now a gas station will feel pain because they get charged back say $50.00 when their profit margin on the gas was perhaps $2.00.

 

[dfchelbay]

I have two things to add for everyone to consider.

1. We have had privacy guard for quite some time. We get the monthly letters stating that there was no activity on our accounts. Got the same letter last summer...AFTER we purchased a new car. Still, to this date, they have not notified us that our SSN's were used and a credit report run at the dealership, not to mention a new account opened for buying the car itself. Choose your credit/SSN protection wisely.

2. As far as the missing personal information at the DMV. With the information that was on that piece of paper, name, DOB, SSN, etc. A credit report could be run on the SSN and a thief can get EVERY account in that person's name. Every credit card number, loan numbers, car loan account numbers, etc. It's all there. As if that weren't bad enough, your credit limits are on there too. A thief can see that you have a $20,000 limit to just go on a buying frenzy with.

 

[jgates]

http://www.jacksoncountybank.com/E-Security.htm

Visit some of the links on this page. It does include the link to get your free annual credit report, etc. Lots of good articles with suggestions & tips on how to handle it.

Here is a link directly to the one on reporting fraud/id theft:

http://www.jacksoncountybank.com/ReportFraud.htm

 

[Cruise]

Have to agree with the others that I doubt it was the DMV. With the information the OP provided to them, the easiest thing for a thief to do would be to open a completely new card that wouldn't even get a blip on the OPs radar for at least a month - and that would only be if the thief were stupid enough to use her actual mailing address for the application. They would have known that using the debit card number would have only gotten them a few "hits" before it was shut down. Why bother with that when they could go all-out with a new card?

Sounds like a skimmer or a test-out of someone using random numbers until one worked (thus, the 65 cent charge).

 

[soccerchick]

Umm, you are out with the lynch mob ready to hang the DMV employee. As others have stated it is more than likely the gas station or ATM that is the source of the compromise. Calm the heck down, notify the credit bureaus and monitor your credit. Put the noose away and quit making unfounded accusations.

For credit cards theft, I agree it is probably not from the DMV, but your DMV story is troubling just the same.

The problem is that dishonest DMV employees can easily create "real" fake ids. My husband, a police officer, was the victim of this exact thing. Our info was taken from a Chevy Chase data entry person and used by a second party at a DMV in Washington, DC. The person who issued the license was paid to issue the fake with all my husband's info, but the perp's picture. It comes back, when run by police, as a valid license. We know this person wrote bad checks issued to him with my DH's info on them.

We can laugh about it now, but it was very stressful. My DH has a very ethnic name and the person who stole his identity was about as far from that ethnicity as possible.

Credit monitoring is a necessity in this day and age.



Get on a credit monitoring service and get the highest level - they have to contact you before opening any kind of account.

 

[sameyeyam]

You can put a Credit Freeze on your name with all 3 major credit reporting agencies. Then if anybody tries to open credit under your name, it will most likely go thru those agencies and will be stopped before anybody can commit identity theft.

Each state differs in how you set up a credit freeze. In most states it's free if you have had credit theft situations. Check with your local Attorney General's website to see how to do this. Your credit will be "frozen" to opening new accounts (for any company that uses credit agencies). If you ever want to "unfreeze" your credit, you will need to give them the password to unfreeze it.

Clark Howard I believe also has information on his website on Credit Freezes.

 

[Redheaded Sunshine]

The same thing happened to me with 2 small online charges under and then a big one. They (Chase Disney Visa fraud dept) told me many times thieves try random cc numbers online for small amounts to find a number that works, then hit up a big charge once they found one. While I understand your concern about the DMV, I would be too, it could be unrelated.

ID Alert is a monitoring service Capital One offered.

This also happened to me, there were 2 small charges...a $20 and a $40...then they drained my entire account via ATMs. I had BofA at the time and I had ONE person who was able to view those charges...then they somehow disappeared and NO ONE else was able to find them. It was bizarre. The man called them "phishing charges." I got every penny back through BofA except that $60 b/c no one else could find it.

Good luck...no matter what anyone else says, I would recommend constant vigilance on your credit accounts.