Credit card number stolen
 

My credit card number was stolen and over $7,000 in fraudulent charges were made. The thief bought bathroom fixtures in PA, Columbia sportswear online, and ate at Bob Evans in MD. :rolleyes:

Citibank is removing the charges immediately.

Now I am worried about general identity theft. Any suggestions about where to go and what to do other than check my credit report?

That is just terrible, I am so sorry! I worry about that kind of thing too, I wish I had some good advice for you :(

lifelock.com

Your credit card company should give you the name and number of that/those company/ies to call to put the credit freeze or check or whatever it is that you do so that no credit can be obtained under your SS#, name without your being contacted. I completely forget what to do. You could try Googling it and you will probably see who it is but your credit card has that info - should have volunteered it. It is a free service to put that lock on your credit.

You should put a fraud alert on your credit reports. Then when someone tries to use your credit they will have to prove who they are. It is easy to do, just call them. I had to do this when my identity was stolen. It worked they called me to verify any transactions that were out of the ordinary, she had even gotten bank loans with my identity, but all was put right and I was contacted when she tried to get a credit card in my name. I think it stays on for several years.

I work in a bank and the first thing you need to do is notify all three credit bureaus. (Equifax, Experian and Transunion) they will put a block or watch on any new credit being applied for and notify you. They should be able to tell you what other steps you need to take.

I knew my YT friends would have the answers. :) Off to call the credit bureaus right now. Thank you!

Will look into Lifelock too.

While the credit report is a must.. it also becomes a pain, cause everytime you try to apply for credit the big three firms will call you at home to verify it is you. Its hard for you to say it is your requesting the credit, when you are not at home to answer the phone call. It does not happen to the average person often, but remember if you are getting a loan, a new cell phone, things that will require a credit validation, you will be immediately turned down until the verification can happen.

But it must be done.

^^I can imagine it is a pain, but much less frustrating than trying to undo a loan theft.

I called Equifax and they put a watch on my report, which they will forward to the other 2 credit reporting agencies. They also confirmed no unusual activity otherwise. Yea!!!! That was too easy. I'm feeling much better. My faith in customer service is restored.

My only concern now is how the card number was stolen...computer? Citibank records were recently compromised. Hmmm.

I'm sorry this happened to you.

I saw (on FB) that this just happened to my friend, she just found out on Saturday. With her, the gas station she went to got hacked, so that's how they got her numbers.

Sad and scary that you can't even get gas!

It was an eye opener for me though, because I never thought of it happening this way. I hope they find the scum behind this.

So sorry this happened, i was wondering how you found out or if it was after recieveing your statement

I think there is a credit card monitoring company which you can use to put a fraud alert as well as to monitor your credit. Was it just the CC that was stolen? My bag got stolen a few years ago and i had my SSN# in it :( so i had to go through this painful process. Good luck!

Oh no! Glad you are being proactive. I'd keep monitoring those credit reports agencies. My information was stolen two years ago, and thankfully everything turned out okay. It was a nightmare going through all the phone calls and paperwork. Good luck!

Ack! There's terrible. :(:( I'm so sorry. I have no advice but hope you can get this resolved. What a pain in the butt.

I was going to ask that. How did you find out?
Seems like Citibanks records are always getting compromised.

Sorry, to hear about you having that happen. I've been there... sadly it was a family member who took out a credit card in my name and racked up almost 10k in charges while I was in college.

I contacted all the credit card agencies and had a fraud alert added to my accounts. I had to prove it was me anytime a credit line was applied for and credit checks couldn't be made for 6 months I believe??

I love that you can now get your free credit report yearly, and still check mine. I think everyone should!

Bleh, its so time consuming going through all that. Glad your bank is taking care of those charges for you :)

It happened with my husband's American Express card recently, and his card never leaves the house usually. They notified us because they thought the charge was unusual. This was a large purchase on an Emirates airline but there were some smaller charges, too. They took care of the charges promptly. He said his online purchases are usually from secure sites, but I'm not sure what caused it. He normally carefully checks the account online regularly for this reason. I hope your problem is rectified quickly.

I am glad you were able to get some action taken on it. Very frustrating and scary when something like this happens. Recently when my husband and I went to Arizona they froze my credit card. It turned out since my daughter was in Illinois using it for gas (with out permission and a card in her name) and we were using it in Az they froze it and called my home. Since we weren't there we didn't know why they were denying charges. It was embarrassing but I am glad they watch those kind of things.

I once had a bank account opened under my name the day AFTER my 18th birthday! They only ran up $1000 but I didn't find out about it until I tried to apply for credit cards and kept getting rejected two years later!!:mad:

So, I can totally understand your pain--and like you I had no idea how my information was stolen (especially since I didn't have any credit cards) I am so glad you were able to solve the problem immediately!

so sorry to hear this has happened to you. I was going to suggest calling the credit agencies and putting a block on your name so they would have to notify you whenever someone was trying to get credit in your name.

I recently had 2 credit cards notify me that their data bases were possibly comprised. One company issed another card, just in case while the other says that no ones credit card info was obtained.

It is so scary to think that this can happen anywhere, anytime. I've always been told that you should request credit reports just to make sure your info is up to date. From my understanding, each credit agency will do this, free of charge, once a year. I need to do this again as I did it once before.

Best of luck to you in catching it all before it's out of hand.

I went through identify thieft a few years ago. They got my DL #. and I had not even lost them. We figure it was through the DL bureau and the number was sold. They had arrested some people for doing that and selling the numbers to illegals. I got info that a third party had tried to use my paypal card when I ordered bows from bowbiz and I had to call and have my cc number changed. I NEVER order anything off the internet and this was the second time I had ordered bows and used paypal in years. I had only used it one other time when I had my babies portrait done. I started to start a thread about it and just didn't. This has been within the past 2 weeks. Hope no one else has had any problem I now have a new credit card and new number and scared to order bows. lol!!!!!!

Thank you again everyone for the support. It's sad to see how many people have been the victim of thieves. Sure, fraud is less painful than other types of crime, but it is still unpleasant.

I found out when I opened my monthly statement yesterday. This is a card that I don't use much and I pay off monthly, so when I saw the balance was over $7,000, I almost fell over.

Your credit card company is good. I was shocked that my account didn't send up huge red flags for unusual use.

I just had my debit card compromised. and a few years ago my credit card got stolen.

The bank told me that scammers set up card readers, mostly at gas stations (pay at the pump) and restaurant (with hand held wireless machines) because they are the easiest to install readers in (pumps are unattended, and restaurants one person distracts the waitress while the other inserts reader).

I no longer pay at the pump, and I am careful when paying at restaurants.

As for the rest of your identity I think you've been given great advice. I just wanted to share what happened to me so all readers know the newest scam.

For debit cards - you receive an email deposit around $1000 that doesn't belong to you. it just appears. The scammer then makes contact with you asking you to send $800 back and as a reward you get to keep $200. That's how the bank manager explained it to me. Luckily it didn't get that far with me, I discovered the extra money, and well after much thought I decided to do the ethical thing and report it. THANK GOD, they took it out of my account soon after I reported it, so I would have been in big trouble if I'd have spent it. Many people I've talked to admitted they probably wouldn't have done anything about it, those people would have been scammed. I guess it pays to be ethical... I did get a spam e-mail which I didn't open, it may have been related to this several days after, but the money had long been returned to the fictitious account it came from.

I just had my debit card compromised. and a few years ago my credit card got stolen.

The bank told me that scammers set up card readers, mostly at gas stations (pay at the pump) and restaurant (with hand held wireless machines) because they are the easiest to install readers in (pumps are unattended, and restaurants one person distracts the waitress while the other inserts reader).

I no longer pay at the pump, and I am careful when paying at restaurants.

As for the rest of your identity I think you've been given great advice. I just wanted to share what happened to me so all readers know the newest scam.

For debit cards - you receive an email deposit around $1000 that doesn't belong to you. it just appears. The scammer then makes contact with you asking you to send $800 back and as a reward you get to keep $200. That's how the bank manager explained it to me. Luckily it didn't get that far with me, I discovered the extra money, and well after much thought I decided to do the ethical thing and report it. THANK GOD, they took it out of my account soon after I reported it, so I would have been in big trouble if I'd have spent it. Many people I've talked to admitted they probably wouldn't have done anything about it, those people would have been scammed. I guess it pays to be ethical... I did get a spam e-mail which I didn't open, it may have been related to this several days after, but the money had long been returned to the fictitious account it came from.

I have had several issues with my credit cards !!
I was told gas stations and restaurants were prim locations to have your card info stolen. There has been a lot of info about "switching" cards at restaurants.. keeping your card and giving a "dummy" card from the same bank back or an expired card from another person. I guess most people don't look at the card they are getting back and just put it in their wallet and go one..to trouble!!

I advise my daughters (and myself) to have a separate account with a debit/credit card from main account to use for online shopping and such. My fear is to be traveling and have a card hacked into and not have access to my funds to get home etc. It is funny that almost all my "troubles" start after a trip or shopping spree.... hmmmm

That is terrible! I'm sorry this happened to you. People can be awful! :( :mad:

About 2 weeks ago my bank called and said my CC had been traced with a skimming device and they had to cancel my card and re-issue a new one.

IDK what a skimming device really is, but she said it's something these people can put in the machine you swipe your CC and trace your acct and card info.

I keep wondering how the bank actually knew it had been "skimmed" or whatever?! Anyways, glad they did!

They probably noticed weird activity. This is what happened when my credit card was stolen. I got a call that said, "Miss d'Eon we'd like to confirm your location." I said "I'm at home in Halifax, NS" "So you did swipe your card at sobeys" "Yes" "But did you just buy a bus pass in Montreal Quebec?" "No" "We are shutting down your card and will send you a brand new one"

It is possible that something weird like that triggered it, it is impossible to be in two places at once, and they confirmed that it was a swiped card not an online transaction, so it was obviously not me.

That is very similar to what the lady at my bank said! She asked me if I had recently been using my card, as in that day. I told her I hadn't in a few days. She said "Yep!, your card has been compromised!" Then she explained the rest but never gave me any further details. only that they were issuing me another card.