Identity theft? How many here have had some experience with this?

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

I just had to shut down a credit card after discovering some mysterious and unauthorized charges.

[Triana]

1. I have. n/t

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

2. Trust me:

Anyone who steals my identity will only destroy themself. ;-)

The last 10 years have been more than a little interesting...

[cherokeeprogressive]

5. Ha. I'm with ya. Wanna fuck your life up? Steal MY identity. n/t

[itsrobert]

3. The closest thing is someone used my 'handle' on other board

ruining my image on other internet boards.

[uppityperson]

14. Good thing They didn't ruin your image here.

[itsrobert]

16. Oh, a stalker?

I thought I was on ignore?

[uppityperson]

19. You aren't that important.

Just because we post on a couple different topics doesn't mean stalking.

[shanti]

4. yes, twice!

:grr: took me about 6 months to fix the first one as i hadn't checked my CR for some time. second time was recent and it was cleared up quicker.

[onehandle]

6. American Express called me a few months ago. I had charged $24 worth of gas in California.

Except I'm in Georgia and American Express wanted to make sure it was me. It wasn't.

They told me that the charge was likely a "test" made at an automated pump with a fake card.

Then later they would make some big purchases.

Amex canceled my card and overnighted me a new one.

They don't know where they got my number.

[rwheeler31]

7. We did years ago, the bank took care of it.

[Critters2]

8. Had my debit card number stolen. The bank was good about fixing things,

but it still pissed me off.

[NRaleighLiberal]

9. We have - we donated to a local charity with a check...soon after, we were down 3K.

Someone got our check and made copies with their own contact info (not a bright criminal, made them easy to find!). I noticed that our balance was down, and it was due to duplicate check numbers - one set authentic, one forgeries. Person spent the 3K in one day at a mall about 100 miles from here. It all ended OK - bank returned all of our money, fellow ended up in jail. Scary stuff, though - if I wasn't vigilant about checking our account on line and let a week or two go by, I assume many thousands would have been spent.

More recently, I've had a transaction on ebay that I didn't order - someone hacked my paypal account. Again, the money returned...but it gives you pause to think of how rampant this must be.

[tabbycat31]

10. yes

back in 2000 before it was popular, I had my (former) high school friend drain my checking account. I wrote her a check to pay her back some $$ and next thing you know my ATM transaction was declined.

She used my account to pay off her credit card.

[pnorman]

11. Twice in the past several years,

my bank (Wells Fargo) contacted me to let me know that they had good reason to believe that my debit card had been compromised. They promptly canceled each card, and sent me a new one by express mail. The numbers were slightly different for each, and I got a full 3 year validity period. No $$$ was lost, so I can't complain!

I do ALL my shopping by internet, including ordering groceries, and it was a bit tedious getting all my accounts updated. But other than that, I have NO identity theft horror stories.

pnorman

[metapunditedgy]

12. Credit cards stolen twice in 15 years. They fixed it up, no trouble.

Just unpleasantness. In both cases, I fortunately caught it within a few days. Given these experiences, I feel more comfortable using credit cards than using cash.

In the second case, my card company even express mailed me a new card so I would have it the next day for use.

In each case I signed an affidavit and that was pretty much the end of it.

I hope there is no third time, though.

[donco6]

13. Several times.

Unauthorized credit card use. And once my wallet got stolen and before I could cancel everything, my SS card was used to start a phone account that they ran up to 700 dollars. It was a real hassle to clear it up.

[liberalmuse]

15. My sister has had that problem a few times...

but she has American Express, and they will call her anytime some weird charge is attempted on her card. I can't even count how many times that has happened.

[oldmant]

17. I have n/t

[jazzjunkysue]

18. My checking has a human password for access: I highly recommend that, and keep your account

offline.

You have to go sit down with the account managers when the bank's open and demand a human password. I can't even make a deposit, at the bank, without them asking me for the password. It's great.

I never set up an online bank account and I never use my real accounts for online transactions.

I have a separate credit card from another bank, entirely for online stuff.

And don't be typing your SS number into anything online, either.

Just don't let it circulate.

Credit card theft is easy. Real identity theft, when they get your account and open a new line of credit that you don't know anything about, because it's sent to a different address, is real identity theft.

That's the stuff that will eff up your credit for months/years.