Worse than spam
Mar. 15th, 2005 09:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mrs_sweetpeach
Our Visa card statement arrived yesterday. Last night I reconciled it against the data I'd input into Quicken and discovered two charges I didn't expect. I wasn't immediately suspicious since ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jebra doesn't always manage to tell me about his purchases prior to the credit card bill's arrival. When jebra got home, I asked him about the charges, but he said he had no clue. I popped over to the web to look up the company name, expecting that once I knew what sort of merchandise they sold, I'd be well on my way to figuring out what we'd purchased. Seconds later, I found dozens of pages discussing fraudulent $19.99, $29.99, and $39.99 charges made by 888-323-8955 PLUTO D Nicosia CY and PLUTO DATA LTD. +18883238955 GB.
I called our credit card company and disputed the charges. They, naturally enough, are canceling the card and issuing us new ones.
Today I did a bit of further reading, and saw that my next step should be to request copies of our credit reports. I got in touch with Transunion and got that report, but that took nearly an hour and I still have two agencies left to deal with.
From what I've seen on the web, the theft does not appear to be associated with a particular company, the type of credit card, the victims' buying habits, or even a geographic region. Cardholders here in the States, in Australia, and in the UK have been hit. An article on MSNBC indicates that "federal authorities" have begun investigating these charges, but does not name the agency allegedly conducting the investigation.
jebra doesn't always manage to tell me about his purchases prior to the credit card bill's arrival. When jebra got home, I asked him about the charges, but he said he had no clue. I popped over to the web to look up the company name, expecting that once I knew what sort of merchandise they sold, I'd be well on my way to figuring out what we'd purchased. Seconds later, I found dozens of pages discussing fraudulent $19.99, $29.99, and $39.99 charges made by 888-323-8955 PLUTO D Nicosia CY and PLUTO DATA LTD. +18883238955 GB. I called our credit card company and disputed the charges. They, naturally enough, are canceling the card and issuing us new ones.
Today I did a bit of further reading, and saw that my next step should be to request copies of our credit reports. I got in touch with Transunion and got that report, but that took nearly an hour and I still have two agencies left to deal with.
From what I've seen on the web, the theft does not appear to be associated with a particular company, the type of credit card, the victims' buying habits, or even a geographic region. Cardholders here in the States, in Australia, and in the UK have been hit. An article on MSNBC indicates that "federal authorities" have begun investigating these charges, but does not name the agency allegedly conducting the investigation.
