This topic is all about vishing (or voice phishing), which is a scam very similar to phishing tactics, but performed mostly through the telephone or cell phone rather than through Web sites or e-mails. This process of vishing is an electronic fraud tactic where unsuspecting people are called or left a message in one form or another, using an automated process (voice recording) stating that your financial account has been possibly compromised and your verification is needed to ensure it hasn't been compromised. What usually follows the message is a prompt requesting you to enter personal information (credit card information, PIN, Social Security number, etc.). Or if it is left as a message on your answering machine, it leaves a number for you to call back and once you call back, it will prompt you to enter your information. Either way, if you do enter that information (and I hope no one does), before you know it, someone out there has your personal information and is probably laughing all the way to the bank. These scam tactics come in all shapes and sizes; the bottom line is that they're out to get your personal information--if you allow them to! And once you read through the answers that Judie received from our members, you'll get a good sense of what's out there.

I know for a lot of you this whole vishing or even phishing thing sounds trivial, and simple common sense tells us to hang up or ignore it. But unsuspecting people will fall victim to these scams, and unless we as a community raise awareness to our families, friends, and co-workers, scammers will continue to prey on those uninformed folks. So as a community, I urge you all to do a good deed and spread the word about these malicious scams to hopefully stop this crime.

Sexci

Hi Sexci_Diva

Well I for one, am pleased to have read your warning and will definitely take heed. Particularly, since I have been caught out with scammers having placed a video recorder the size of a button, on many ATM machines around Auckland. (Happened about 2 years ago!)

It meant all those that unwittingly used the ATM machine, was being monitored and recorded the numbers you pushed for your ID accessing into certain bank accounts. I lost an invariable amount of money for a most frustrating weekend.....I was in the process of shifting, and to my astonishment, I found my account was cleared out within half an hour of previously using the ATM machine!

However, I soon got a call from the Head Office in Frauds Department in Christchurch, asking if I had noticed a substantial amount of money been taken from my account! Hell yeah, I sure had noticed!!!

After many hours of sorting out ID details and red tape that goes with fraud cases etc, I was finally told that the guy whom had instigated scamming ATM machines and "getting rich, quickly" was from Toronto! All this was work was run by the click of technology....laptops, mobile phones and miniture cameras or video recorders!

By the way....the bank paid every cent back to those that lost thousands through this pirating...but it was not an easy process as you can imagine! It took a considerable amount of time, to check everyones details and correct amount of money in peoples accounts at the time.

In my next bank statements, it showed the time and amount of tried and failed accessing ALL other accounts this pirate had tried, in a matter of two hours.

I am pleased to say this guy was caught and his tribe of people that helped him set up the cameras throughout USA, NZ, UK and God knows where else!

Suffice to say, I have a myriad of numbers and word coding to now access ALL my accounts!

Unfortunately, there will always be some pirate out there competing with the latest scammers and technology...


Katz

Dear Katz I was totally horrified at what happened to you, and it brought tears to my eyes at what is happening to nice decent law abiding souls...

Did research on the net, and yep, it is more rampant than we relize...

My god, soon we are all going to have to be looking over the shoulder if anyone is watching etc..

No wonder that I sometimes think moving to some remote place with no humanity, just animals would be ideal for this artist...

Antartica comes to mind often as does some remote village in Norway, LMAO...

Hi Scorpianwoman

It was a weekend that was filled with frustration!
As soon as this Pirate entered the account...the bank noticed it straight away, only because it was a considerable amount that was drawn in one go.

Thanks to their technology, they traced it to being drawn from Toronto and yet I'd previously drawn a couple of hundred dollars only half an hour ago, in Auckland New Zealand!

That's when the bank froze all accounts and I had just spent the 200 on groceries, but needed to access another account to pay for the furniture removals and other expenses one faces, when shifting!

Low and behold, I soon realized I couldn't access any accounts at all, and of course it was the beginning of a four day public holiday, and being a weekend....ALL BANKS CLOSED!
Luckily family came to the rescue and after a week of sorting out red tape etc, I was able to have ALL money replaced into a new account.

Later on televised news, they said this scammer had become a multi millionaire within days, from networking accounts throughout the world!

In answer to your moving to remote areas to escape this sort of thing....lol I can understand the hast in needing to get away from it all!


Katz