Reply to: Someone tried to steal all my money

[Menelaus]

I've been issued one of these from the Nat West, a bit annoying if you don't have it on you at work when you're trying to buy stuff
They also cancelled my card last year when I was in Crete - without telling me, as I was out of the country, I let them know now if I'll be going away.

I also had it cancelled a month ago as there had been some suspicious activity on my card. I had not seen any money go from my account, but It sounded like someone had tried to get money from it.

I'm quite happy to put up with a little annoyance if It makes it harder for crims to get at my money

The Cretan thing is a pain in the a*se. I worked for the company that manufactured the software used in the auths module to either cancel or in any other way interfere with your card use when you're abroad and, unless you go abroad regularly and to the same places, it'll automatically generate a high-risk alert which will either cancel the card or at least alert an operator to try to get in touch with you.

[expat]

I set up a 'shadow' account that I use for the interweb. I put about a hundred quid on it, and keep it topped up, keep the card pinned to my pc so I dont have to find it when I'm pissed

I do the same. Specifically asked not to have an overdraft facility. Additional bonus is, when I have to transfer money from main account to this one, sometimes by the time it arrives I don't want to buy the dingus any more.

[EternalOptimist]

Remember that the OP here was about someone else attempting to make an online purchase, not do online banking. And the point is that Verified by Visa is not secure.

A keypad won't help. A random code generetor keyfob won't help. Antivirus, antispyware, shifting key entry pads on online banking, won't help. It won't help even if you never do any online banking or online purchases. Someone else can, if they have:

card number
card name
expiry date
security code
your date of birth.

All but the last are available to anyone who has ever had your card in their hands.

I set up a 'shadow' account that I use for the interweb. I put about a hundred quid on it, and keep it topped up, keep the card pinned to my pc so I dont have to find it when I'm pissed

[expat]

Remember that the OP here was about someone else attempting to make an online purchase, not do online banking. And the point is that Verified by Visa is not secure.

A keypad won't help. A random code generetor keyfob won't help. Antivirus, antispyware, shifting key entry pads on online banking, won't help. It won't help even if you never do any online banking or online purchases. Someone else can, if they have:

card number
card name
expiry date
security code
your date of birth.

All but the last are available to anyone who has ever had your card in their hands.

[Pogle]

When I lived in Ireland, I had 2 accounts, Bank of Ireland and Rabodirect.

BOI changed their login screen to choose digits via drop downs - everyone complained, so they changed it back.

Rabo on the other hand issue you with a small number generator device, as part of the login process they give you a number which you type into the device and it gives you a number back that you then enter into the website.

I've been issued one of these from the Nat West, a bit annoying if you don't have it on you at work when you're trying to buy stuff
They also cancelled my card last year when I was in Crete - without telling me, as I was out of the country, I let them know now if I'll be going away.

I also had it cancelled a month ago as there had been some suspicious activity on my card. I had not seen any money go from my account, but It sounded like someone had tried to get money from it.

I'm quite happy to put up with a little annoyance if It makes it harder for crims to get at my money

[dinker]

"Someone tried to steal all my money " Was it the Government?

[jmo21]

When I lived in Ireland, I had 2 accounts, Bank of Ireland and Rabodirect.

BOI changed their login screen to choose digits via drop downs - everyone complained, so they changed it back.

Rabo on the other hand issue you with a small number generator device, as part of the login process they give you a number which you type into the device and it gives you a number back that you then enter into the website.

[Moscow Mule]

ING Direct have a number keypad which you have to click on, and the position of the numbers changes each time. That's the best method I'ver seen.

[minestrone]

Luckily, my card got blocked because the bank's system auto-flagged the transaction as suspicious. Would have been nice if they'd phoned me instead of blocking my card though... I sometimes don't use this card for weeks at a time.

They shut my card ooff twice when shopping in Paris and never let me know, I suppose one time I was trying to buy 1200 quid worth of suits in Armani but the other was for 2 fairly minor purchases.

I complained and said they could have left me high and dry if I was paying for an expensive meal at midnight, they said that I should contact them before I go on holiday, I said 'what would happen if I my card got stolen when on holiday, then you would just keep it switched on' 'Eh eh, yes, I suppose'. Idiots.

I don't know why people cannot do the Lloyds system where after the password they ask you for 3 chars of your 'special word' which has to be put in by dropdown boxes, that would kill off key loggers for a while.

[cojak]

All this talk of viruses and keyloggers is missing the point about how easy it is. Nobody stole your password, somebody changed your password. That's what you do when you have "forgotten" the old password. All you need is the details that are printed on the card, plus the cardholder's date of birth. Then Verified by Visa will allow the person attempting to make the purchase to select a new password on the spot.

WHS - any security of the "Verified by Visa" protocol is completely illusionary....

One of the most important things you need to keep to yourself while on the web is your date of birth. Which is why I always lop a few years off when sites ask me for it (for security purposes only, you understand...

[OwlHoot]

This definitely sounds like you've ended up with a keylogger on your system. If that is the case, the only safe course of action is a clean install, then a deep search for anything such as nasties that have been implanted in your BIOS or other obscure places.

Beats me why banks, in view of these blasted keyloggers, still expect users to type in digits for procedural passwords. Surely it would be more secure to download a small image of a sequence of digits or letters and have the users click on suitable characters or checkboxes by each. Something like that would also be practical for mobile devices.

I'm aware that some malicious software can do screen grabs. But surely a suitably designed procedural authentication along those lines could be designed to leave the screen unchanged, assuming users could be expected to enable Javascript.

If something has got onto your system that can do keylogging and upload its findings, it's comparatively trivial for it to download a dodgy BIOS update and put it in place for the next time you reboot and every reboot thereafter, including after the re-install of the OS. No re-install of Windows/OS X/Linux will cure that, hence the need for a deep search. I believe the tools suggested earlier in this thread should take care of this, but you ought to check that they promise such protection to be sure.

Why on Earth does Windows allow the BIOS to be updated in normal "multi-user" mode?! It's yet more evidence that Microsoft on the quiet actually welcomes viruses, as infections encourage more PC upgrades.

[expat]

All this talk of viruses and keyloggers is missing the point about how easy it is. Nobody stole your password, somebody changed your password. That's what you do when you have "forgotten" the old password. All you need is the details that are printed on the card, plus the cardholder's date of birth. Then Verified by Visa will allow the person attempting to make the purchase to select a new password on the spot.

[d000hg]

All these anti-spyware apps have free/premium editions. I have no problem shelling out a whole $30(!) for something decent, but is there much to be gained over the free versions?


If any problems remain, I'd be half-tempted to just buy a new PC, I'm almost due one anyway and since I work from home it's a relatively small outlay. I could ram it full of security software before copying any files on from current PC. I'm never 100% confident that any software can properly clean a 'dirty' PC any more than you can take a 5-year old Windows installation and get it working as fast as it did when new.

[NickFitz]

More on "Verified by Visa" from The Register - DO read on to page 2, for that is where the meat is. However, the salient point is clear on the first page of the story:

Both VbyV and SecureCode are based on 3DSecure, a name that hints at the introduction of some kind of three-factor authentication scheme. But unlike robust authentication techniques, hackers don't have a hardware token generating one-time passwords to worry about - it's just more of the same. And since card details + CVV number is no longer considered as secure enough then it's hard to see how card details + CVV number + VbyV login is any more robust.

[NickFitz]

This definitely sounds like you've ended up with a keylogger on your system. If that is the case, the only safe course of action is a clean install, then a deep search for anything such as nasties that have been implanted in your BIOS or other obscure places.

If something has got onto your system that can do keylogging and upload its findings, it's comparatively trivial for it to download a dodgy BIOS update and put it in place for the next time you reboot and every reboot thereafter, including after the re-install of the OS. No re-install of Windows/OS X/Linux will cure that, hence the need for a deep search. I believe the tools suggested earlier in this thread should take care of this, but you ought to check that they promise such protection to be sure.