Posted by Peter Brady on Thu 9th November 2006 at 06:00 AM, Filed in Fraud
Have you ever done anything criminal to fund a spending spree? Most sensible people wouldn’t of course.
So what was going through the mind of the school governor’s wife who has been jailed for spending £3,000 on other people’s credit cards buying things like lingerie, clothes and horse riding equipment! Using card details from two ladies she had met at a school fund raiser the lady in question embarked on the fraud and has paid heavily for it with an eight month jail sentence.
Hertford Magistrates Court said that she had “robbed Peter to pay Paul” when her husband fell ill and she was struggling to pay the mortgage.
Her husband added: “The victims are all people that she knows. To expect to get away with it is beyond me. In a close-knit village like Widford it has caused great consternation. Some people have completely ostracised her. “It’s going to be awful, it’s not going to be a very happy village.”
(Via This is London)
Posted by Peter Brady on Wed 8th November 2006 at 06:00 AM, Filed in US Credit Cards
The New York Times reports on the privacy pitfalls of no swipe credit cards. Oh boy isn’t that a worry!
According to the article researchers Tom Heydt Benjamin and Kevin Fu were able to easily retrieve data from the new cards - data without encryption and in plain text.
“They could skim and store the information from a card with a device the size of a couple of paperback books, which they cobbled together from readily available computer and radio components for $150. They say they could probably make another one even smaller and cheaper: about the size of a pack of gum for less than $50. And because the cards can be read even through a wallet or an item of clothing, the security of the information, the researchers say, is startlingly weak. Would you be comfortable wearing your name, your credit card number and your card expiration date on your T-shirt?’ Mr. Heydt-Benjamin, a graduate student, asked.”
If you’re a college student you may want to check out the Chase +1 Student Visa Card with Flexible Rewards.
Aesthetically it’s a very nice looking piece of kit - shades of the Amex Black!
Chase say:
“When you buy your clothes, gear and tunes why not choose to reward yourself? Save with low interest rates, get great cardmember benefits, and establish your credit history at the same time.”
The features include:
Read more...
In a rather unusual marketing ploy JP Morgan Chase is using a New York bike taxi company called BicyTaxi to offer free trips into the city for Ann Arbor students.
Here’s the catch - the bikes are kitted out with speakers that pump out the latest strap line for the Chase +1 Student Visa.
So if you live in Ann Arbor and fancy a free trip into the city watch out for cabs operating 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
The offer lasts Monday to Thursday until Nov. 2.
(Via BankNet)
Visa recently announced that it’s operations outside Europe would be consolidated into a global corporation.
A large proportion of it’s stock is to be offered to the general public.
Visa’s current status is as a private membership association owned by approximately 20,000 financial institutions globally.
The decision by Visa comes on the heels of a move by MasterCard to go public last May. Since MasterCard’s initial public offering, the company’s stock price has surged 84% in four and a half months.
The stock offer could come in 12 to 18 months with “The first phase of Visa’s restructuring will involve a series of mergers involving Visa USA, Visa Canada, and Visa International, resulting in a corporation owned by the members, while Visa Europe will remain a membership association owned and governed by its European member banks and become a licensee of Visa Inc.”
