Identity Thieves Don’t Need Your Credit Card or Even the Number to Steal It.
By Dr. Joyce Starr | January 8, 2013
Filed under Credit Card Rights, Economic Rights, Topics
Just when you think it can’t get worse, it does.
RFID Wallet – Protect Your Cards
According to a credit card executive I spoke with, the latest ploy is that credit card thieves run a series of numbers – something like a lottery.
Master Card, Visa and American Express each start with identifiable numbers.
Credit card thieves then append random numbers and keep running them through a program.
Eventually, they hit the lottery – your card. You can’t understand how it happened – or why there were 10 charges to your card in a matter of minutes for high end purchases in another state.
The card was never out of your site, and you haven’t even used it in the past few weeks.
Credit card theft is now truly virtual. If credit card companies know this is happening, what are they doing to stop it? Not much it turns out. RFID protection won’t stop those lottery programs, but it can provided an added layer of protection.
Protect your cards with an RFID wallet, RFID shoulder bag or RFID purse.
Important Update
Angie Picardo at NerdWallet alerted Rights Radio to a timely article on this issue.
Using a Credit Card at the Gas Pump? Thieves Could Have the Key to Your ID by ANNADEGUZMAN on November 12, 2012.
If you use your credit or debit card to pay for gas, be warned: You might be at risk for identity theft. NBC Bay Area’s investigative unit found nine credit card data-skimming devices in the past two months, and puts the number of identity theft victims at more than 300. How can your data be so easily stolen, and what can you do about it?
Universal key aiding identity theft
There is reportedly a single, universal key providing access to the majority of gas station pumps nationwide, enabling thieves to install skimmers, high-tech devices that store swipe information, and resulting in hundreds of cases of credit card fraud in the South Bay. The universal key was created, again, for convenience purposes, to simplify gas pump inspections and maintenance. Read More…
