January 23, 2001

8:47 AM

A guy paid $5000 to a bankfor a list of 4 million credit card numbers, complete with name/address of the owners. He proceeded to start making false charges to those cards totalling some $37 million. He's going to jail. My question is, what the hell was the bank thinking? Why are they selling something like that? Didn't they recognize the potential for abuse? What possible legitimate use could such a list have?
posted by Steven Den Beste (8 comments total)

What I don't get is, with a crime so easily traced, why the guy stayed in the country. He could have done it all from overseas, and lived forever like a king. What a dumb ass.
posted by jpoulos at 8:52 AM on January 23, 2001

The Federal Trade Commission was first alerted to the Internet scheme in 1999 when angry consumers began flooding the agency with complaints.

This is what often happens. You can't complain without having to flood. It's almost impossible for a govn't agency to act upon scams. Our company got scammed out of over 11k two months ago. We can't do anything about it. The company that did this, still operates. This guy *operated* for 8 years, how could he?

Also, Why was he offered the list? Is it not illegal?
posted by tiaka at 8:56 AM on January 23, 2001

Not my area of competence (is any?), but I would say that those whose numbers were given by the bank ought to have a huge class action law suit going. They will win.
posted by Postroad at 9:14 AM on January 23, 2001

Well the credit companies would be liable for any erroneous charges (not to mention the bank) so it wouldn't exactly seem to be class action time.
posted by zeoslap at 9:28 AM on January 23, 2001

Spam?
posted by holloway at 11:46 AM on January 23, 2001

What kind of a loser do you have to be to fail to make money with a porn site?
posted by aaron at 2:14 PM on January 23, 2001

This is great - straight from the bank's web site:

Charter Pacific is a strong proponent of the Right to Financial Privacy, and does not engage in selling any form of client data, customer profile, or other customer information to outside marketing firms or other third parties.

PSHAW!
posted by tatochip at 12:10 PM on January 24, 2001

What my thread is about credit card fraud and I just started working at a credit card call centre? Spooky...
posted by feelinglistless at 2:54 PM on August 28, 2001