How to Avoid Credit Card Fraud
In this modern digital age, there are many ways to have personal information, including an entire identity, stolen within just a couple of minutes. In fact, most people never find out how they were defrauded or how their credit card details were acquired after their identity has been stolen.
Learning of the credit card fraud immediately after it has occurred and reporting it the card company is the best way to stop the fraud from affecting one’s credit score. Credit monitoring services are a great way to catch fraud as it happens; however, prevention is far more valuable. Learning the leading causes of credit card fraud and how credit card details are acquired by thieves can provide protection from unnecessary credit mishaps.
The following privacy and credit card usage tips will help anyone avoid becoming one of the thousands of credit card users each year who are victims of credit card fraud.
How Credit Card Details are Obtained
There are dozens of ways a thief can obtain credit card information and make purchases without the victim ever suspecting it. Usually the theft occurs when a card is used to make a purchase, either online or in person.
Online credit card theft is the most common, as many people do not make sure they only patronize secure websites. However the following types of credit card theft are often overlooked. Keep in mind, a thief does not have to actually steal the credit card to make purchases with it later. The following list illustrates some of the most common types of credit card theft.
• Service Industry Theft
Many restaurants allow their servers to carry the customer’s credit card to the processing machine and then return it. Servers are usually in busy environments, and it can take several minutes for them to return to the table with the card. Most people don’t imagine their server might jot down their credit card information during this time, and use it later for purchases online or over the phone, but it happens.
This type of manual credit card theft is more common in less classy restaurants, bars, and strip clubs, in which the environment is dark, crowded, noisy, and suitable for any kind of theft or illegal activity. Anyone working in the service industry and deals with credit cards is a possible credit card fraudster.
• Card Swiping
Stealing credit card details in broad daylights in front of the customer is not as easy, but it does occur more often than one would think. Advanced credit card fraudsters use card swiping devices that automatically obtain all of a card’s information and store it in a convenient USB disk. Some thieves bring these card swiping utilities with them to work and slide customer cards through them before or after sliding them through the actual processing machine. Card swiping devices can also be fraudulently installed on ATM machines, stealing the credit card details while the card holder withdraws funds.