Another day, another scam

A bloke at work fell good-and-proper for a new-style Nigerian scam today.
He was selling an item for ~£250 and was contacted by said Nigerians who
agreed a price. They then sent a cheque for the asking price, plus a
"little extra," with the story that they were buying the item on behalf of
someone else (who the cheque was from), and requested that the difference
between the cheque's value and sale price be returned to them by way of
commission for the sale. "Fine," says bloke at work, not smelling too much
of a rat. Besides, if the cheque bounces, he won't ship.

The cheque turned up this morning, and it's value? Not £300 or something
like that, but a whopping £1100. Any rats that were liable to be smelt
should have been stinking good and proper at this point, but no, he takes
the cheque to the bank, giving the benefit of the doubt to the purchaser.
After all, no Nigerians have ever been caught scamming in the past ;-)

Now it turns out (according to the newsgroups), that this cheque is highly
likely[1] to be fraudulent and from some unsuspecting person's bank account.
Apparently cheques aren't fraud-checked when they go to be cleared, but only
if when someone raises an objection (i.e. much later when they realise that
their account has been debited incorrectly). By this time, of course, the
scammer has their laundered money by way of 'commission'. The bank then
seeks to retrieve the funds back of the unsuspecting seller. Oh dear, oh
dear.

[1] i.e. certain

 

Slider wrote

It is not new style, you just haven't kept up with the times slow boy.

 

Ah well, it's hard to keep up with this new-fangled inter-web thingy.

 

It is indeed. My bank, who I online with swear blind a payment of £100
went into my account on 16th. There is no bloody payment showing, even
though I made it and now my bloody credit card's over the limit.

"It'll show on your next statement"

Arse.

 

I had a little "to-do" with my bank about online banking and paying
bills. After a little complaining in the right tones they coughed the
non-payment fees for the bills. Just waiting for the next statements
to make sure all's sorted out before I let the matter go though.

 

What were the right tones? I've been phoning up every day about it for
the last few days only to be fobbed off an told it would be on my
statement. I told them it wasn't as it wasn't showing on my online
balance/transactions list. "It takes a few days to show", they said. "It
normally shows after 3 days", says I. "It'll show on your statement as
showing on 16th", they said.

I got my paper statement yesterday and as predicted it isn't there.
That's when I phoned again and complained and when they went through the
whole "it cleared on the 16th" stuff again, except this time they said
"it will show on your next statement".

I took the name of the person who dealt with me last night and their
team leader in a bid to get something done but like a ****[1] I didn't
write it down and expected it to stay in memory[2]

I'm going to wait for the next statement but frankly, I'm not holding my
breath.

[1] Does this mean I'm banned from the EOSM?
[2] A bloody tall order in any case :-\

 

I set up the payments to be paid using a "make a payment in the future"
option. I write down on the bill I'm paying when I set up the
transaction, how much for, and when it's due to go out. As I was able
to say to them "look, I did it here, for this much, to be paid then" it
lends a lot of credibility to the story of "I pressed all the right
buttons in the right order, and now you've fucked up and cost me
money". As they can check when I logged in they can see that I was
when I said I was.

If you can tell them details then it makes it much harder for them to
worm out of it.

 

<snip>

At this point, as ukrm's well-known "online banking technophobe", I
would like to emind people of just how *easy* it is to hack many online
bank accounts.

DAMHIKIJK,OK?

 

So, is there a way to cancel the online access?

 

Well, for me, getting my login details wrong three times denies me
access. I have to request another set of details and numbers etc.

Good advice about logging times etc BTW as I only knew the day I logged
in and roughly when it should've cleared.

Cheers.

 

Should TOG paranoia overcome me I'll do some random keyboard bashing
then. It'll be just like usenet[1].

[1] **** off, I'm doing that joke.

 

Or, as I told my old man (who has similar tendancies), if you don't do
online banking, the only person who can't access your account is you.

I would like to know HYK though. Is there a tale to be told?

 

Dunno.

But it can be very easy to access some online accounts. Remember - bank
computers are secure, but individuals' own computers aren't. And that's
the weak link.

Why do you think some banks (Barclays, among them) have recently started
using drop-down menus in order that their customers can enter dates of
birth and other info? Because they can't be picked up by keyloggers.

 

You want a nice little Mac, you do.

Oh, you already have.

 

Ahh right. While I've got you - these "egg" things, what do you do
with them again?

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Christofire

Bit of lube, pop them up inside and carry on about your business wiv
extra orgasms. Apparently.
--
Nigel - Manufacturer of the "Champion-104" range of rearsets

WS* GHPOTHUF#24 APOSTLE#14 DLC#1 COFF#20 BOTAFOT#150 HYPO#0(KoTL)
ZZR1100, Enfield 500 Curry House Racer "The Basmati Rice Burner",
Honda GL1000K2 Kawasaki ZN1300 Voyager "Oh, Oh, It's so big"

 

And how may we use badgers to drive the French from these shores?

 

Nigel Eaton says...

More fun dry, believe me.

 

IMO, using a keylogger to steal a password isn't hacking, not by a long
stretch. I'd put it on a par with picking someone's pocket and stealing
their credit card.

 

Well, semantically that's probably true. Fact remains - it's still
terribly easy to do, and not all banks use drop-downs yet.