Friday, October 16, 2009

paranoid much?

two separate incidents have happened recently that have made me paranoid.

first--a couple of days ago i got an email in my creative kerfuffle email box and i ignored it at first. something about a magazine and would i like to....i don't know, i skimmed it. when i did finally read it (i really thought it was spam) it was from an online magazine for women that wanted to sell me an ad to promote my blog on their web site. i wrote back (still thinking it was spam) and said i didn't really think my content was suitable for their readers---i mean i say fuck and douche canoe and talk about lots of....stuff. she wrote back and said she'd read some of my posts and thought her readership was a good fit. alas, i'm not spending money to promote my blog. it's private. it's only for you guys. and me. mostly for me.

second--about a week ago we got a letter from a heathcare provider saying that a server of theirs which housed some of my records had been hacked. they had since shut that server down etc. taken all the precautions on their end, etc. but i should contact the credit companies. when the hubs told me about the letter i have to be honest, i half listened and didn't think it was a huge concern. if someone wants to steal what little money i have, let them try. then, today, i had a voicemail from someone claiming to be from my bank's debit card fraud agency. i called the toll free number. the guy asked for my social. i said, uh, no, not to be rude but i don't even know that this is my bank, i'm not giving you that info. he said fine, go into your local branch or call the number on the back of your card. i called my local branch. the woman said she'd had another call like mine this week and that i needed to speak to their fraud guy--i left him a voicemail. then i dug out the letter that started this whole thing and found the info to call equifax. oddly enough, that automated system asked for my social, address and phone number. i gave it. crap. was the WHOLE thing a scam? the letter a fake? the equifax number a phony?

both of these things kind of freak me out a little.

holy hell. i bet the da vinci code is REAL and so is area 51 and johnson had kennedy killed. great.

HOLE.E.HELL--before i posted this i got another call and indeed it was my bank's debit card fraud department and some douche canoe in richmond, va has our debit card numbers and is going to town at walmart, target and cvs. just today. so, the cards are closed down and once all those charges post my bank will refund all the money. HOLE.E.HELL batman.

5 comments:

Penny said...

Oh man that totally sucks, but I'm so glad they caught it and that you'll get your money back!

Unknown said...

When we lived in CA, in the space of 6 months we had someone steal a check and then my debit card. The first people whitewashed my check and bought a bunch of beer at wal-mart. The second people took it a Chinese restaurant. They weren't major things, but I felt incredibly violated from them and felt we had no control over what happened with our money. We had to file two police reports and it took a while to get back the money.

the Mayor said...

WOW is all I can say. This stuff is all so tedious and overwhelming. I know I should be more diligent on all this stuff, I'm too trusting.
Just got a notification from another network I'm on warning about facebook and twitter security problems.Ugh.

Gal Friday said...

This same kind of thing happened to us a few years ago--some guy in South Carolina was shopping with our card at Wal-Mart and Home Depot. At least we could find out these scammers had used our credit to purchase airline tickets to Paris or Bora-Bora or something....

Astarte said...

How do people even shop when they don't have the actual card?! Were they just doing it online? Or were they opening new accounts? Sheesh!

My in-laws had someone steal their info and take a trip to Europe a couple of years back. Yuck.