Cash machine users urged to be vigilant (From Gazette)

The only way to beat these ATM cons. Is as follows
1. Do not put yourself at risk. Boycott all ATM’s unless they are inside a bank.
2. Instead of using cash or credit, cards just use cheques or Cash.
3. Drawing cash from the bank may be a little time consuming yet it is much more secure.
4. If you wish to purchase something over the internet contact the company by hard wired land line (not Radio Phones)(cordless type)
5. By telephone, you are asked questions by the companies’ operative, so you ask them one. (“What is your name”) If anything goes wrong, you know the company and an employee’s name.
6. Make time to go to the bank to draw cash it is safer that way.
7. Many superstores have a cash back facility that can be used out of banking hours.

I have been robbed of a large sum, fortunately I got it all refunded by my excellent Bank. I now use many of the items listed from 1 to 7.

If however, you are unable to do the above for whatever reason,
Then instruct your bank to make debit card withdraw able amount £30 and if someone attempts to draw more cancel your card. When you know you are going to withdraw more do it at the bank in person.

http://wearecolchest
er.freeforums.org/in
dex.php

What is this forum for?
Is it just for people from Colchester? Is it belonging to the Gazette or are you just another extension to the cash machine hoax.

Please do not be offended because I am being very cautious once bitten twice shy. Replies here please.

Allan Whitehead wrote:
What is this forum for?
Is it just for people from Colchester? Is it belonging to the Gazette or are you just another extension to the cash machine hoax.

Please do not be offended because I am being very cautious once bitten twice shy. Replies here please.

If you are referring to nick2480's post, which he has put into all or most recent threads, be very careful. He does not explain what his forum is. If you look at his home page you will be none the wiser. Don't register to read stuff from an unknown person.

For crying out loud if you are careful and observant then you can use a cash machine easily and a lot more conveniently than the ridiculous paranoid rigmarole outlined above. Secondly the Internet is littered with hundreds of thousands of non descript blogs but again if you use an ounce of common sense all you will be supplying them to register is an email address (registration isn't compulsory) there really is very little risk involved, besides like most attempted Colchester blogs this one will be gone in a few months.

ShadowReturns wrote:
For crying out loud if you are careful and observant then you can use a cash machine easily and a lot more conveniently than the ridiculous paranoid rigmarole outlined above. Secondly the Internet is littered with hundreds of thousands of non descript blogs but again if you use an ounce of common sense all you will be supplying them to register is an email address (registration isn't compulsory) there really is very little risk involved, besides like most attempted Colchester blogs this one will be gone in a few months.

ShadowReturns
Sir/Madam, I think your attitude is un-called for you sound to be one of those people who talks about being vigilant in a manner that would offend certain people. With all the con men and women and out to get you smart
Posterior people that seem to have risen being vigilant will not always protect from being taken advantage of. Only the other week an elderly person had her bag snatched with all her possessions including her purse.

She was being vigilant her purse was in her bag and out of site. We also heard about money being snatch at cash till (ATM) in broad daylight in a busy area the man gave chase and caught the individual. The rest I leave to your vivid imagination. Sir/ Madam finally we have always thought being safe has always been better than being sorry.

Allan Whitehead wrote:
The only way to beat these ATM cons. Is as follows
1. Do not put yourself at risk. Boycott all ATM’s unless they are inside a bank.
2. Instead of using cash or credit, cards just use cheques or Cash.
3. Drawing cash from the bank may be a little time consuming yet it is much more secure.
4. If you wish to purchase something over the internet contact the company by hard wired land line (not Radio Phones)(cordless type)
5. By telephone, you are asked questions by the companies’ operative, so you ask them one. (“What is your name”) If anything goes wrong, you know the company and an employee’s name.
6. Make time to go to the bank to draw cash it is safer that way.
7. Many superstores have a cash back facility that can be used out of banking hours.

I have been robbed of a large sum, fortunately I got it all refunded by my excellent Bank. I now use many of the items listed from 1 to 7.

If however, you are unable to do the above for whatever reason,
Then instruct your bank to make debit card withdraw able amount £30 and if someone attempts to draw more cancel your card. When you know you are going to withdraw more do it at the bank in person.

Few issues with this...
2 - instead of using cash or card use cheques or cash? Firstly, few places accept cheque any more. Also, you said instead of using cash use cash...
4 - Unless you're purchasing from a terrible scamming site or have a key logging virus installed it won't make any difference whether you're shopping over wireless or wired. Even if for some reason you're using unencrypted wireless the transaction will be done using 128bit (or more) encryption, and while a hacker would try and go for that for something like company financial details, confidential information or such, they're not likely to bother for something as small as an individuals card details. And if you do have a key logger or use dodgy sites a hard line isn't going to fix that.
5 - Ever been called by a scam company? They have their stories straight, so asking them questions won't really do much. Having a fake name for a scam operative isn't going to fix an issue if things go wrong. If you get a call tell them you'll ring them back and call the actual number.

Not much point scaremongering, at the end of the day it isn't a huge issue; banks insure you for things like this, so in the rare case someone might skim your details most of the time the bank will flag the weird transaction and block your card before calling you to check the transaction, and if they don't then they'll refund it anyway and issue a new card. Fair enough a few of those items are sensible, but I wouldn't suggest things like stopping using wireless for internet shopping, because the security gained from using wired is a tiny fraction of a percentage of what you get shopping online anyway.

maybe if banks were to open 24/7 us people that work fulltime might be able to go in and draw money out but until then cash machines it is!!!!

wormshero wrote:

Allan Whitehead wrote:
The only way to beat these ATM cons. Is as follows
1. Do not put yourself at risk. Boycott all ATM’s unless they are inside a bank.
2. Instead of using cash or credit, cards just use cheques or Cash.
3. Drawing cash from the bank may be a little time consuming yet it is much more secure.
4. If you wish to purchase something over the internet contact the company by hard wired land line (not Radio Phones)(cordless type)
5. By telephone, you are asked questions by the companies’ operative, so you ask them one. (“What is your name”) If anything goes wrong, you know the company and an employee’s name.
6. Make time to go to the bank to draw cash it is safer that way.
7. Many superstores have a cash back facility that can be used out of banking hours.

I have been robbed of a large sum, fortunately I got it all refunded by my excellent Bank. I now use many of the items listed from 1 to 7.

If however, you are unable to do the above for whatever reason,
Then instruct your bank to make debit card withdraw able amount £30 and if someone attempts to draw more cancel your card. When you know you are going to withdraw more do it at the bank in person.

Few issues with this...
2 - instead of using cash or card use cheques or cash? Firstly, few places accept cheque any more. Also, you said instead of using cash use cash...
4 - Unless you're purchasing from a terrible scamming site or have a key logging virus installed it won't make any difference whether you're shopping over wireless or wired. Even if for some reason you're using unencrypted wireless the transaction will be done using 128bit (or more) encryption, and while a hacker would try and go for that for something like company financial details, confidential information or such, they're not likely to bother for something as small as an individuals card details. And if you do have a key logger or use dodgy sites a hard line isn't going to fix that.
5 - Ever been called by a scam company? They have their stories straight, so asking them questions won't really do much. Having a fake name for a scam operative isn't going to fix an issue if things go wrong. If you get a call tell them you'll ring them back and call the actual number.

Not much point scaremongering, at the end of the day it isn't a huge issue; banks insure you for things like this, so in the rare case someone might skim your details most of the time the bank will flag the weird transaction and block your card before calling you to check the transaction, and if they don't then they'll refund it anyway and issue a new card. Fair enough a few of those items are sensible, but I wouldn't suggest things like stopping using wireless for internet shopping, because the security gained from using wired is a tiny fraction of a percentage of what you get shopping online anyway.

I must admit Sir/Madam you certainly know more about this scam game than I do. I will take your information on Board.
Thank you for the extra strings to my bow.

ShadowReturns wrote:
For crying out loud if you are careful and observant then you can use a cash machine easily and a lot more conveniently than the ridiculous paranoid rigmarole outlined above. Secondly the Internet is littered with hundreds of thousands of non descript blogs but again if you use an ounce of common sense all you will be supplying them to register is an email address (registration isn't compulsory) there really is very little risk involved, besides like most attempted Colchester blogs this one will be gone in a few months.

Pretty much agree with the above. People do need to be aware of skimming, but no need to take it to the extent of never using a cashpoint. Personally, the only time I could get to a bank in person is Saturday.

People do need to guard their PINs, however, and also watch for people standing too close. If you do have to write the PIN somewhere, write it in a code that you know. Amazing how many people actually write their PIN on their cards. Just use common sense and it should be OK. Also make sure you know how to contact your bank quickly, so that you can close any cards quickly before any major damage is done.

As for the new forum, I had a look and it looks much like others which have opened up. In all cases, the hardest thing is to get people signed up. I think it´s just free publicity rather than anything sinister. A good tip is to have separate e-mails addresses: one for personal e-mail and another for anything such as this. That way, if their website gets hacked (quite possible if they haven´t set their own security well), you will hopefully avoid too much spam. And then you can close down that e-mail address if you need to, without losing everything else.

It´s very easy to get a new e-mail address, just takes a few minutes.

There are a few good sites out there such as snopes.com, which can keep you updated on scams which are going on. Anybody who asks you for a password is a scammer, anything which seems too good to be true is a scam.

Having said all the above, there´s no need to be completely paranoid, but it´s worth being aware of the ways that these things can work.

Allan Whitehead wrote:

ShadowReturns wrote:
For crying out loud if you are careful and observant then you can use a cash machine easily and a lot more conveniently than the ridiculous paranoid rigmarole outlined above. Secondly the Internet is littered with hundreds of thousands of non descript blogs but again if you use an ounce of common sense all you will be supplying them to register is an email address (registration isn't compulsory) there really is very little risk involved, besides like most attempted Colchester blogs this one will be gone in a few months.

ShadowReturns
Sir/Madam, I think your attitude is un-called for you sound to be one of those people who talks about being vigilant in a manner that would offend certain people. With all the con men and women and out to get you smart
Posterior people that seem to have risen being vigilant will not always protect from being taken advantage of. Only the other week an elderly person had her bag snatched with all her possessions including her purse.

She was being vigilant her purse was in her bag and out of site. We also heard about money being snatch at cash till (ATM) in broad daylight in a busy area the man gave chase and caught the individual. The rest I leave to your vivid imagination. Sir/ Madam finally we have always thought being safe has always been better than being sorry.

Ok to put it into context how many transactions do you think are carried out using ATMs across the globe every day? And how many of those transactions are fraudulent, I'd happily bet perhaps less than 1%. So in the grand scheme of things your advice above stems from 1 experience you have had and a large dose of paranoia. Your decision to support your claims by mentioning 2 completely different crimes to the one you suffered shows how desperate you are for straws to grasp at and some of your "advice" just highlights you don't really know what you are talking about.

Dont use banks, they are bigger robbers than the criminals targeting cash machines!

ShadowReturns wrote:

Allan Whitehead wrote:

ShadowReturns wrote:
For crying out loud if you are careful and observant then you can use a cash machine easily and a lot more conveniently than the ridiculous paranoid rigmarole outlined above. Secondly the Internet is littered with hundreds of thousands of non descript blogs but again if you use an ounce of common sense all you will be supplying them to register is an email address (registration isn't compulsory) there really is very little risk involved, besides like most attempted Colchester blogs this one will be gone in a few months.

ShadowReturns
Sir/Madam, I think your attitude is un-called for you sound to be one of those people who talks about being vigilant in a manner that would offend certain people. With all the con men and women and out to get you smart
Posterior people that seem to have risen being vigilant will not always protect from being taken advantage of. Only the other week an elderly person had her bag snatched with all her possessions including her purse.

She was being vigilant her purse was in her bag and out of site. We also heard about money being snatch at cash till (ATM) in broad daylight in a busy area the man gave chase and caught the individual. The rest I leave to your vivid imagination. Sir/ Madam finally we have always thought being safe has always been better than being sorry.

Ok to put it into context how many transactions do you think are carried out using ATMs across the globe every day? And how many of those transactions are fraudulent, I'd happily bet perhaps less than 1%. So in the grand scheme of things your advice above stems from 1 experience you have had and a large dose of paranoia. Your decision to support your claims by mentioning 2 completely different crimes to the one you suffered shows how desperate you are for straws to grasp at and some of your "advice" just highlights you don't really know what you are talking about.

To be fair to Allan, there is a bit of a fine line between being aware of a potential problem and paranoia. Even 0.01% of a million transactions is 100, and there are many more than a million cashpoint withdrawals per day.

It is good to know that a cashpoint snatcher would be chased down the road. Anybody who snatches an old lady´s handbag would hopefully be chased just the same way. Of course, plastic cash is actually safer in some ways, because there will be a transaction trail. Cash in a stolen purse is gone. If a cashpoint card is stolen, it can be blocked quickly.

Allan´s points are probably being over-vigilant in a way, but it is still good to be aware that cashpoint scams such as skimming do exist, and to know what to do if it does happen to you.