Visa Warns: Hang Up On Credit Card Crooks
Illawarra Mercury
Thursday February 19, 2004
FRAUDSTERS pretending to be from Visa International's fraud squad are cold-calling the credit card company's customers and asking for sensitive information.
Visa said the scammers were calling customers claiming to be part of investigations into unauthorised purchases on their credit card.
The fraudsters give their names and ``official-sounding" security numbers and said they were calling to verify whether the cardholder had recently made unusual purchases on their credit card.
When the cardholder said they had not made the purchase, the caller said a fraud investigation would begin and a credit would appear on their next statement.
The fraudster then said they needed to ``verify" that the cardholder had possession of their card and asked for details of the card's three-digit security number.
A Visa spokesman said the number of customers who'd been contacted was unknown but was unlikely to be many.
``It's not widespread. We're not saying that hundreds or thousands of people have been called," he said.
The spokesman said it was similar to a email scam where fraudsters emailed cardholders asking for personal security details online.
``Here's a more in-your-face variation," he said.
It was difficult for police or card issuing banks to investigate who the fraudsters were because ``it's a phone call".
In another fraud case, bank HSBC said its customers had been contacted in an email scam aimed at gaining access to their banking details.
``The fraudulent spam email contains a hyperlink to a log-on page which requests people to input their online personal banking numbers and password," HSBC said, adding customers should ignore any emails requesting private information.
The Australian Bankers' Association said ``no bona fide organisation, including a bank, will ask you to reveal your banking passwords or log-on identification". This information shouldn't be shared.
© 2004 Illawarra Mercury
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