I can't believe that came from your mouth!
Posts tagged credit cards
LULZ: Visa Disallows Payments for Medical Marijuana
Jul 12th
Loads of potheads and hippies are completely butthurt over their inability to purchase their “medical” marijuana at California dispensaries using a Visa credit or checking card. That’s because it is against Federal law for the credit agencies to finance illegal transactions, and pot is still a drug that is considered illegal at the Federal level. So its cash only for now, at least until the Feds shut down more California pot shops.
From the SFGate here:
If you’re about ready to refill your supply of medical marijuana, you might want to stop by an ATM first. In the past few days, a number of Bay Area dispensaries have told their clients that from now on it’s cash only, because Visa and MasterCard aren’t allowing their cards to be used for marijuana purchases anymore.
Harborside Health Center in Oakland sent its patients a similar message, blaming a “continuing federal threat of seizure against financial institutions.”
In fact, Harborside, the largest medical marijuana dispensary in the country, is facing a federal seizure threat of its own. On Wednesday, it was served notice from the U.S. attorney’s office in San Francisco that its facilities in Oakland and San Jose are subject to forfeiture because they are being used to “distribute and cultivate marijuana.”
Although marijuana for medical use is legal in 17 states plus the District of Columbia, it remains verboten as far as federal law, and the feds continue to take a dim view of commerce surrounding the practice.
For its part, San Francisco’s Visa said Wednesday, “Visa has not changed its policy. Our policy is that Visa cards should only be used in connection with legal transactions. We do not allow the Visa payment system to be used for any illegal activity and have banned illegal transactions on Visa cards. Merchant banks, also known as acquirers, are responsible for ensuring that their merchant customers comply with all applicable laws.”
Every time a hippie cries I get a case of the giggles. I love it that Visa is not allowing purchases for pot and I love it more that Obama’s Federal Agents are shuttering pot shops.
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Loading ...The Hologram Makes the Credit Card Authentic, Right?
Apr 9th
F-Secure has a great blog post up about a Chinese printing company that will sell you or any hacker authentic dove holograms just like the kind you find on a VISA card.
So rest assured that those carder gangs that steal credit card numbers can really duplicate a card for use on the streets.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Arrests Made in Heartland Data Breach
Feb 19th
The number of financial institutions that are reporting to have been affected by the Heartland Payment Systems breach have reached over 200 400. That list is here. I originally blogged about the largest cyber breach ever here. And some criminals are getting caught using the stolen credit card information.
From Bankinfosecurity.Com here:
The list of financial institutions impacted by the Heartland Payment Systems (HPY) breach now tops 220. In related news, three men in Florida were arrested earlier this week on multiple charges of credit card fraud, and some of the card numbers they used are tied to the Heartland hack.
The Leon County, FL. Sheriff’s office arrested area residents Tony Acreus, Jeremy Frazier and Timothy Johns, who had allegedly used stolen credit card numbers since November.
According to the Tallahassee, FL. Democrat, the suspects were running “a very sophisticated and complex criminal enterprise.” Law enforcement is investigating how the three men were able to obtain credit card numbers from the Heartland breach, which was first announced on January 20.
Meanwhile, in just over a week, the number of financial institutions that have come forward to say they have been contacted by their credit card companies Visa and MasterCard in relation to the breach has jumped from fewer than 50 to more than 200.
If these criminals had already obtained the credit card information in November, this breach occured earlier than first thought. And I certainly don’t think these guys were the masterminds behind this plot. They are merely a carder gang that got busted.
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(1 votes, average: 6.00 out of 6) Loading ...Phishers Detected Testing Credit Card Numbers
Nov 20th
Say you are a criminal and have managed to phish hundreds of credit card numbers away using email scams and fake online ecommerce sites. How do you test the validity of the accounts?
If you were a pickpocket, you could swipe a stolen credit card at a gas pump and see if it works. But “virtual credit cards” don’t work that way. How do you see if they work? You donate a penny to an online charity or politician.
From Brian Krebs of the WaPo here:
On Nov. 8, Wikimedia saw hundreds of penny donations come in over a very short period of time. In many cases, Wikimedia donors leave messages of support or praise for the organization along with their gift, but all of the fake donations were anonymous and contained no greeting, suggesting their submission may have somehow been automated.
Wikimedia spokesperson Sandra Ordonez said “those one-penny donations, it was costing us more to process them,” she said. “We were actually getting negative money back.”
Wikimedia has now increased the minimum contribution it will accept to one dollar.
So if you notice a penny deducted from your account, panic.
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(No Ratings Yet. Rate It!) Loading ...Credit Card Cloning Scam
Oct 28th
If you are like me, you probably believe that most cashiers and waiters are honest, hard working folk, and often harding working that you are. Waiters, bartenders and cashiers are always on their feet, hustling to keep you happy or keep the line moving at the store. But would they rip you off, right in front of your face?
There is an interesting video that shows how some scammers use card readers to swipe your credit card details. By watching this video you can help spot the tactics to know if someone is trying to rip you off.
Things to watch out for:
- Taking the credit card to an unusual spot in the pub- like the kitchen or a “better lit” spot at the end of the bar.
- Clumsy drops of the credit card
- Someone pretending to “clean” the magnetic strip
- Too much scrutiny of the signature. Are they memorizing the CCV?
Stolen credit card information is not often used immediately by criminals. A valid credit card with a pin number is considered as black market currency to hackers. They will often trade such information to other hacker groups in exchange for botnets, software exploits, or denial of service attacks. It could be weeks before anyone tries to steal money from your account.
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(2 votes, average: 4.50 out of 6) Loading ...
