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| ATM Skimming device |
So yesterday morning Lovejoy receives a phone call from the bank enquiring about our spending activity over the previous evening. Did you spend £80 last night at 20.56pm he asked? This threw me into a slight panic because I have been known to have a couple of glasses of wine and then go on a bit of an online spending spree and forget all about it until the stuff turns up, ( I do not do this regularly and not for ages). No I said not guilty. Anyway to cut a long story short we are the victims of the Russian Mafia at work in Cancun. We used the ATM once in the hotel reception. Apparently ATM skimming is big business in Cancun with around $5million being stolen from holidaymakers every month
krebsonsecurity.com. The bank informed us that this was the third time they thought our account had been compromised and asked us where we had been. Cancun we said. We checked our bank account and there were two separate withdrawals of £100 each to a timber company in Mumbai dear lord. We are ok we will get the money back but what with this and half the trip taking in Spring Break (we knew nothing about this) I do not think we will be going back to Cancun any time soon. However, I loved the Mayan archeological sites so it was worth it for this alone.
They are good at their criminal activities. Easy to see where $80, $100 even can go without thinking while on vacation. They never do really big amounts-just lots and lots of little ones that take a while to be discovered until there is enough of an unusual pattern. I am too trusting that this will never happen to us, but of course it has, ad it was dealt with, and then we go about our days, but I wonder how many little ones got through without anyone catching on. Good work on your bank's part.
ReplyDeleteThe bank were very good and we will get the money back. It's taught us a lesson though to only use ATM's inside a bank as they are much less likely to be targeted
DeleteHow do you know they're Russian!! x
ReplyDeleteI googled criminal activity in Cancun and that's what came up. I didn't know Russia had a mafia lol
ReplyDeleteWish we could string them up!!! My daughter got caught in a diet pill scam in Costa Rica. She had never been there. LOL. And I had many a charges in England and was never there. I just got a notice from Bank of America that out credit card was compromised by an undisclosed merchant and we will be getting new cards. So give me the name of the merchant. No they are going to protect them. Now I have to put in new numbers for all of our reoccurring charges.
ReplyDeleteDear lord the world has gone mad. When we looked at our statement online it said it was some timber company in Mumbai lol. Its only one card we have to change so not so bad.
ReplyDeleteI was most put out when some toerag tried to book a holiday in Italy on my credit card when they hadn't actually had the good manners to either invite me along or even ask me where I might like to go! Arilx
ReplyDeleteWhat a bloody cheek lol
ReplyDeleteThat is terrible - but I fear this kind of thing is popping up all over. Our Canadian banks are telling us the USA is the worst for skimming when I called them to let them know we were going to Spain. They don't ask to be notified at all when traveling to Europe.
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