Credit Card Blog

Archive for Card Security

Protect Your Credit Online with This One Step

September 12, 2009 at 9:25 am · Filed under Card Security

If there was a single task you could perform to help keep your credit card information safe online you would do it, right? Think about all of the programs and offers that you hear about everyday that try to get your money. They have their place and can help keep you safe. But you should not use them unless you are first doing this one thing that can help you just as much – and it does not cost a dime.

Change Your Password

That’s it. This one simple task can help keep you from trouble by making it much more difficult to hack into your account. And that goes for all of your online banking activities and accounts.

Changing your password helps if it ever falls into the wrong hands from being used against you. A password is the lock on the front door to your account. It is the most basic of security tools (like the keys that you use on your home).

Change it often. Make it a priority to change your password at least every three months. This will require you to go in to each and every account and change them, but schedule a time just as you would do for an appointment and get it done.

Make your passwords hard to hack. Use a combination of letters and numbers (usually you cannot use symbols). Mix them up and make it very difficult to guess or piece together with information about you. Use a small paper journal with a pen to keep your passwords written down and safe.

That’s all it takes to strengthen your security, your credit and your life. Do it today.

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The One Thing You Can Do Right Now to Prevent ID Theft

September 5, 2009 at 11:49 am · Filed under Card Security

Turn on your monitoring activities. You have probably heard this before, but it is the one thing that you can do right now and it’s free. Monitor EVERY account that you have, and do it OFTEN.

Monitor Credit Card Activity Watch your credit card account activity carefully (WEEKLY). There are some identity thieves that are stealing small dollar amounts (between $6 and $12) out of thousands of accounts. You might be surprised at the number of people who refuse to do anything about that small amount. At least have your credit card number changed so that it does not happen again. In fact, change your credit card number every several months to help keep you from being a victim.

Monitor Checking and Savings Watch the activities on your checking and savings accounts (EVERY FEW DAYS). Avoid giving out your bank routing number and checking/savings account numbers to creditors. If you pay with your credit card number, it can be turned off and a new one issued with little interruption to you. Getting a new checking and saving accounts are major hassles.

Monitor Credit Reports Performing a weekly check of your credit report is too much overkill. But, depending on your comfort level, a quarterly check is definitely not overkill. At the very least, an annual check is mandatory.

Remember, this is your financial health we are speaking about, and your money is at stake. The bad things that can happen to you not only include incredible inconveniences, but also loss of money that will be almost impossible to replace. The old adage of “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” applies.

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Heartland Payment Systems Breach: How Bad Is It?

August 19, 2009 at 1:49 am · Filed under Card Security

Heartland Payment Systems, a payment processor based in Princeton, NJ, handles about 100 million transactions a month. So you can imagine the sinking feeling their employees felt when they realized that Heartland’s computer systems were infected with malware that compromised the security of the many credit and debit cards used in those transactions. According to analysts, this could be the biggest data breach the world has yet seen.

So what data didn’t get compromised during the breach? Heartland reps assured customers that “no merchant data, cardholder Social Security numbers, unencrypted PIN numbers, addresses or telephone numbers” were involved. Unfortunately, credit and debit card numbers were likely targeted.

What can you do if you think your card details have been compromised? According to Heartland, the best thing to do is keep a close eye on your monthly statements. You can also have your cards flagged for possible fraud, and your accounts frozen. For a more permanent solution, cancel the cards that may have been breached, and replace them with new ones.

Under federal law, credit card holders are only responsible for up to $50 of unauthorized charges. Debit card holders can be liable for up to $500.

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Fraud Alert: Unauthorized Charges from PPC Flash

August 12, 2009 at 12:09 pm · Filed under Card Security

The Golden Rule in preventing credit card fraud is to keep a sharp eye on your monthly statements. Some thieves will take your card information and use it to fund a spending spree, while others will make small charges on thousands of victims’ cards.

The Better Business Bureau has reported that citizens in 9 states have received unauthorized charges from a company called ‘PPC Flash’. The average amount of the charges is $6 to $12 per transaction.

So far, the investigation is ongoing, and officials haven’t been able to locate the company behind the fraud. Scammers often make small charges to avoid alerting suspicion from either the cardholder or their issuing company.

If you find unauthorized charges from PPC Flash on your credit card statement, contact the Better Business Bureau and your state Attorney General’s office. Then contact your card company to dispute the charges.

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Reality Bites Super-Hacker

August 4, 2009 at 8:50 am · Filed under Card Security

If you thought tales of espionage, double agents and multi-million dollar fraud operations were the stuff of movies then think again. In a plot more complicated than anything Danny Ocean or any of his thirteen cronies could dream up the super hacker, Albert Gonzalez, planned to pull off the biggest credit card information theft in history by stealing a staggering 130 million credit and debit card numbers.

Gonzalez dubbed his audacious scheme “Get Rich or Die Trying” and the 28 year old will certainly no doubt be praying the latter part of his prophecy doesn’t come true. The hacker is set to spend the next 35 years behind bars and faces a fine of $1 million.As if the plot wasn’t sensational enough, the web deviant was reportedly a former government informant advising them on security issue until he as found to be working as a double agent selling vital information to prominent hackers. If this wasn’t reality it would almost be too far fetched to believe but unlike many of the popular Hollywood movies it is unlikely that Gonzalez will see a happy ending.

For those of you who are worried about your financial security then here are some quick tips to prevent you falling foul to criminal like Gonzalez:

Be Vigilant – routinely check your credit card statements each month for any anomalies. The faster you can spot then and inform your credit company the better.

Save Receipts – Make it a standard practice to save all receipts from credit or debit card purchases. That way you can always back-up your claims.

Use Common Sense – Never give your card number out to strangers over the phone (the bank would never need to call you to ask your card number). Use ATMs at banks rather than convenience stores if possible (the security is likely to be better at the bank). Only shop on secure websites with the code “https” in the address bar.

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What to do With Old Credit Card if Moving to a Better Card

July 30, 2009 at 12:49 pm · Filed under Card Security

If you’ve decided to move your balance from one credit card to a new credit card with better terms, you should think about what to do with your old card. Cutting it up with scissors isn’t going to cancel the account or ensure you can wipe your hands clean of responsibility from the old account. Here are some tips for handling an old credit card when you get a new one:

If you haven’t moved an entire balance from the old card to the new card, call the credit card company to obtain the accurate pay off balance. Make the final payment, then determine if you want to leave the account open as available credit or close it completely.
If you’ve decided to close the account, listen to the offers presented to you by the representatives when you call to cancel the account. They will most likely attempt to keep your business with better offers and deals. If they don’t offer anything better than the new card, or the offer just isn’t that great – continue to cancel the account and ask for a written confirmation that the account has been canceled.
I f you decide to keep your old account open but unused – don’t forget to pay attention to the statements that come in the mail. Even though you won’t have a payment due, keep an eye on it to make sure that no one has compromised the account and made unauthorized transactions.

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Luxury Google Ads for People With Higher Credit Scores

June 30, 2009 at 5:02 am · Filed under Card Security, News, Card Technology, Announcements

If you thought credit scores were only used to help lenders decide whether or not they should extend credit – think again! Sure, you may know that there are employers who run a credit check before they hire; and that your car insurance premium is partly based on your credit score… but did you think your internet browsing would be affected by your FICO?

Google has started to experiment with their Google ads by showing more expensive products and services to individuals with higher FICO scores. Google has always been known for their pay per click advertising and the ability for advertisers to target specific markets – but is this taking it a step too far?

Right now, there is a database of about 2 million people through “Compete”, who agreed to share their credit score when applying for a new credit card. These people are then targeted with specific Google ads when they use their computer, based on what their credit scores are. This allows advertisers to reach consumers who qualify for their products – for example, advertisers trying to sell mortgages to people with FICO scores over 700 would only show their ads to this group of internet users. Primarily, this data will be used to target users seeking credit cards, but any company interested in displaying ads to a group of people with a specific credit score would be able to do so.

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You Won’t Believe What Your Credit Card Company Knows About You!

June 19, 2009 at 7:21 pm · Filed under Card Security, News, Card Technology

It wasn’t long after credit cards were first introduced in America that the companies realized it wasn’t the people who paid their balances in full each month that would make them the money – it was the people who carried a balance from month to month that would help them become the multi-billion dollar industry they are today.

The trouble with giving credit to the riskier customers of course, was that they had to figure out how to decide which cardholders would pay something each month, and not just run up a huge bill and skip out completely.

Two solutions were created – the first was to create a number of different credit cards, each with different credit limits, terms, and interest rates and give them out to people based on their credit score and credit worthiness. The second solution was a strategy to learn how different types of customers pay their bills. Companies started analyzing how people behave based on what kind of purchases they made on credit cards – and you might be surprised just how detailed their investigations and research have gone.

In 2002, an executive at Canadian Tire had breakthroughs in credit cardholder research when he analyzed the information from every customer who paid with credit card at Canadian Tire stores. The stores sold electronics, kitchen supplies, automotive goods and sporting equipment. Martin could see what cardholders were purchasing. He was able to pinpoint which brands people bought who would continue to pay their bills on time versus the brands people bought that would result in late payments or no payments at all.

People who used their credit card at a bar would typically miss credit card payments, while 47% of people who used their cards at a specific bar could be expected to miss 4 payments in a 12 month period!

Math geniuses who did nothing but study the trends and statistics of credit card use versus how the cardholder makes their payments were hired by all the major credit card companies to analyze risk for lending.

People having babies or getting married were shown to be more responsible with their credit cards and suddenly credit card companies were marketing to people getting married or having babies. Signs of depression or desperation (like seeing marriage counselors or going to pawnshops) would result in credit card companies reducing credit lines since they were more risky.

“If you show us what you buy, we can tell you who you are, maybe even better than you know yourself,” said Martin, who now works for Wal-Mart Canada. “But everyone was scared that people will resent companies for knowing too much.”

Data driven psychologists are not only employed by credit card companies to determine a cardholders level of risk, but also to handle their credit card collection calls. They know how to talk to people and what to say to get money out of them based on the things they’ve bought and the things they say during the phone calls.

Learn more about credit card company psychology: NY Times article

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The Case for Government-Backed Credit Cards

April 26, 2009 at 12:57 pm · Filed under Card Security, News, Credit Card Debt

We’ve got government programs to back up home purchases (Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae), and now there is a possibility that a government-sponsored agency will be created to back credit card debt. Before you say “no way”, consider that this is nothing unusual for many other countries. For example, Germany, India, Iceland and France all offer credit cards from state-owned banking institutions.

First of all, a state-backed credit card would offer lower rates than the typical credit card interest rate of 18% or more. A state-backed credit card might have an interest rate of 8% or so, and still be able to turn a profit. There wouldn’t be a need for the surprise hidden fees or notifications that your interest rate is increasing to two or three times the amount you had been paying.

Of course, you’d have to have really good credit scores to qualify for a state-backed credit cards but really, that’s the way it should have been from the beginning. When banks started lending credit to college students and people who had bad credit scores, (not to mention the number of mortgages that were given out to people who clearly wouldn’t be able to afford them) the economy as a whole began to decline. Now millions of people are debt-ridden and with the increased interest rates, they have very little hope of every climbing out of debt by making payments.

A benefit of state-backed credit cards would be similar to affinity or charity based cards. For example, with every purchase you make using your card, you could be giving a small percentage to wind-farm construction, green living, school equipment needs, or government research. Maybe a small percentage of credit card purchases could help fund the Social Security funds and balance the government budgets.

People are concerned that the government is sticking it’s “nose” in places it doesn’t belong, but the benefits of having government-backed credit cards are too good to ignore completely.

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Credit Card Details Found on Old Computers, Gaming Consoles

March 31, 2009 at 1:06 pm · Filed under Card Security

If you’ve decided to sell your computer or gaming console, don’t throw in your credit card information to sweeten the deal! Some sellers have learned the hard way that your personal information can fall into the wrong hands when you sell your computer. Additionally, dealers who bought pre-owned consoles (including the X-Box 360 and Playstation 3) from Circuit City were shocked to find the hard drives, profiles, and credit card information still intact. Circuit City did not wipe the information before shipping the consoles to other dealers.

If you’re selling a computer, merely deleting the information isn’t enough. Even formatting your hard drive leaves your data vulnerable. Instead, look for a data shredding program to keep your deleted data gone for good. These programs work by overwriting your data numerous times, making it impossible for standard data recovery programs to retrieve.

Removing your credit card information from a console like the X-Box 360 takes a little more effort. The credit card details aren’t actually stored on the machine’s hard drive, but are instead linked to your profile at Microsoft. To keep the console’s new owner from making purchases with your card, you’ll need to call customer service and have them delete the credit card from your profile.