My son's account was recently hacked and cleaned out, and he's in the extended process of trying to recover things. Access to his account likely came through some Sony Playstation or standing XBox360 account. He's a gaming freak, and I seem to remember mention of one of those companies being hacked last year.
Someone about a year ago did a couple of trivial software and then movie ticket purchases on my credit card. I suspect that one sourced back to Dell computers, as we had done an online purchase from them about 2 weeks previous. The initial try was also a Dell purchase.
The typical approach is to try a couple of small purchases like tickets or a meal to see if a number will work. If it's a go, then they'll max it out in a couple of hours.
When the wife and I plan some extensive travels or high end purchases now, we always call the card company and give them a heads up. We had a card shut down when I was fueling in BC about 10:00 PM once on a trip to Alaska. Not a big deal, but I had to wait until morning business hours in the Central time zone before I could get things reactivated. I'm fine with them keeping an eye out for extremes purchases of sudden geographic moves.
I've also received calls from vendors to confirm substantial purchases, and understand their need to do so. With online activities, secret card readers, and physically handing our cards over at times, theft is bound to happen. To date, we've been lucky and never lost a dime to such activities. Knock on wood.
It's a pain in the ass to change everything, but I guess it's the price we pay for convience these days. Seems near everyone we pay bills to (power, cable, electric, etc) wants to execute automatic withdrawals these days. I have plenty of time, so I resist giving withdrawal access to others. Deposites, OK. Withdrawals, not so much.
Good luck with your stuff,
Last edited by 1minute; 01/06/12.
