Some BofA clients find debit cards canceled

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2006/02/09/BUGHLH55SQ1.DTL&type=tech

Numerous Bank of America customers have had their debit cards canceled and have been blocked from accessing their accounts online after an unnamed company experienced what appears to be a major security breach.

BofA is refusing to identify the company, saying in letters to customers this week only that the breach occurred "at a third-party location unrelated to Bank of America."

This is unusual. Past data-security breaches involving financial institutions have centered on systems being compromised at either bank offices or those of affiliated firms.

Michael Chee, a BofA spokesman, confirmed Wednesday that the breach in this latest case wasn't at a processing center used by the bank or any other affiliate.

The implication is that the breach likely involves a merchant that receives payments via customers' debit cards.

Just last week for the 3rd time in about 4-5 years I had this happen to me with a big bank in PA. Wonder if this is related and if any other big banking cards are in jeopardy?

[woodsprite]

1. I just had a problem with a bank where Paypal,

handling charges for a merchant, put thru fraudulent charges to my account. Paypal was saying it wasn't fraud since the name was correct, the address was correct and the account info was correct (they say frauds don't do that) - except that I had nothing and no site of mine had anything to do with WebHits Direct. They contacted me back and appologized, but I still haven't been credited back almost $300 taken out of my checking account. My account or debit card isn't associated with PayPal at all so it's not that I had a PayPal account they got mixed up. This is strictly a PayPal service offered to process the payments for that merchant.

Maybe it's something like that.

[melm00se]

2. better off

that your card gets shut down than siphoned dry by a bunch of crooks...good for the bank, good for the customer.

[RamboLiberal]

4. The bad part though is when you as a customer have to sit

high and dry for the 1-2 weeks it takes them to send you a new card. Could also be an embarassing problem if you only have your debit card, go to pay for something like say a meal in a restaurant and find out your card has been cancelled. This could've happened to me, and it taught me to carry some back up cash and another credit card.

I think if it's their screwup the least they could do is overnight a card to you.

And I have no clue why they restrict the online access.

[melm00se]

6. same thing would've happened

if the bank had done nothing: account drained to zero, checks bouncing like superballs, fees piling up...use the card and it gets declined...altho I do agree that BoA should have expressed out new cards, they might have but the article doesn't

(BTW, I used to run the frauds department for a bank...much easier to head off a problem at the pass, than filing all those forms and waiting...the law allows for up to 10 days to respond)

[aquart]

3. In what nation is this third party company?

Do terrorists now have the personal information of how many Americans?

[RamboLiberal]

5. Good question - the problem with the PA bank I deal with

in the past few weeks was occurring in a former Iron Curtain country from what I gathered. What was scary was the thieves were actually using ATM's to take money from accounts so they also had the PINS. I didn't get hit this time but the bank still sent a new card - they didn't even bother informing me till I got the card though this time my old card was still good till I activated the new card. First time this happened they cancelled the card without telling me.

2nd time it happened I caught some fraudulent transactions for about $150 and I had to go a couple of rounds with them to get them to admit it was fraud.

This is third time around for me.

And then I've also gotten letters from DSW Shoes, Lexis-Nexis, telling me that my personal info might have been compromised. I wonder how many places my SS# and DL# are working?

This has gotten way out of hand and of course our Repuke government is doing nothing.

[EFerrari]

8. How do we know the Thuggery wasn't the outlet?

I guess I'm now officially a paranoid. Because the first thing that I imagined was that Big Brother also has access to bank records and that an underpaid federal employee could be dipping in his/her spare time.

:(

[henslee]

7. Its a good idea to maintain one account with no ATM card attached to it.

[EFerrari]

9. If they get one account number and a pin, can't they relate

other accounts to it? Unless, it's at a different institution I guess.

No ATM and no on line banking might be better. . .

[melissinha]

10. remember they use Diebold

I know its unrelated, but remember that BofA is Diebold's #1 customer.

I still have yet to close, waiting for Bank of the West to come to Texas.

[fleabert]

11. i had that happen a few months ago, with bofa.

sucked. didn't find out the card was cancelled until i tried to use it. no letter, no email, nada.

[VegasWolf]

12. BofA are jerks when it comes to fraud. I had almost $900.00

fraudulently taken from my account. It was obvious from the address the items were sent to that it was fraud. Nevertheless, it took 2 months to straighten it out after several letters from BofA that it was indeed my transaction. Fortunately, I have a LOT of money in BofA and I threatened to move it elsewhere, then they finally saw that they had indeed made a mistake. Makes me wonder what might of happened if I hadn't been able to threaten them. Also, fortunately I had plenty of money in the account that the $900.00 deduction didn't start causing checks to bounce. Just a helpful insight to others.

[area51]

13. More data thievery

I wonder if this has anything to do w/offshoring.

[Maven]

14. BofA is a terrible bank, in general.

They practically defraud their own customers, with "creative" assignment of fees.

Not suprising.