Credit card code security scam

Identity thieves are in search of your three-digit credit card security number.

The New York State Banking Department has issued a warning regarding a telephone scam designed to get consumers to reveal their three-digit security numbers found on the back of credit cards.

Regulators advise the scam works like this:

A fraudster calls you identifying himself as an employee in the Security and Fraud department for your credit card company. (He might recite a false company badge number, to appear legitimate.) The fraudster, who has already illegally obtained your credit card number from another source, falsely continues stating that your card has been flagged for an unusual purchase pattern involving a recent purchase under $500. (Five hundred dollars is the minimum amount for a purchase pattern flag for most credit card companies.)

The fraudster then asks if you charged a purchase in a certain amount from a specific merchant, implying that he is reading from your account transaction record. When you state "No", the caller reassures you that a credit for that transaction will appear on your next billing statement, and provides a phony control or confirmation number to "document" the fraud.

The fraudster then asks for the three-digit security number found on the back of your credit card, allegedly to prove that you have the card in hand and it has not been lost or stolen.

If you provide the three-digit security number, the New York Banking Department says that within 15 minutes the fraudster will usually make a purchase in the amount he told you was flagged. Having already been warned, you may not find the appearance of that transaction on your billing statement alarming, and you won't suspect anything until it's too late. The promised credit, of course, will not appear.

Regulators advise that individuals who receive such calls should hang up and call their credit card company (toll-free numbers are, usually shown on the back of the cards) to verify the call as legitimate.

If the call turns out to be fraud, consumers should close the credit card account, file a fraud report with the bank and local police, and monitor their billing statement and credit reports.

 Source: www.buffalonews.com