Be Careful Out There!

Not my normal type of post this is true life

Andrew Westcott
Aug 23, 2017 · 2 min read

Yesterday my wife received a letter from her bank. It asked her to telephone them as soon as possible because a possible fraudulent transaction had been detected on her account and her bankcard had been blocked.

When she telephoned a kind lady on the other end explained that an amount of £1.00 had been debited from the account as a dry run, and then a further transaction of over £200 was tried at ASDA. This was declined by the bank and they subsequently blocked the card.

The reason that this was suspicious activity is because it did not follow the usual pattern of use on her account, and luckily she did not have £200 in there either. I should explain that this account is normally only used to receive her pension, which is then immediately transferred into our joint account.

We are at a loss to explain how the fraudsters could have obtained details of her debit card. In the last 12-months the card has only been used outside of the house on one occasion when a cash withdrawal was made by my wife from a NatWest ATM machine last August. And it was used once in an online purchase of a gift from a reputable retailer.

I am very careful when using the internet. I have a firewall and network protection, virus checker and scan regularly for threats. I use secure passwords different for each website. And I do not open the attachments of emails received from unknown parties.

But still the details of her account leaked out somehow, hence the title “Be careful out there”.

)

Andrew Westcott

Written by

I am a writer and a reader and I enjoy doing both immensely. I live in the South West of England.

Welcome to a place where words matter. On Medium, smart voices and original ideas take center stage - with no ads in sight. Watch
Follow all the topics you care about, and we’ll deliver the best stories for you to your homepage and inbox. Explore
Get unlimited access to the best stories on Medium — and support writers while you’re at it. Just $5/month. Upgrade