I very rarely use my Bank of America ATM card. Who uses cash anymore anyway? But every so often, there’s a reason to have some cash handy.
A couple of weeks ago, I had the new driveway sealed by the asphalt outfit that paved it a couple of years ago. The two guys the company sent did a perfect job, and when they were done I handed each of them a $20 bill. Good for beer, snacks, and lottery tickets.
To make cash withdrawals, I use the ATM inside the branch office of a local savings bank — with only one recent exception. Generic ATM’s are not to be trusted. Not ever. But what about an official Bank of America ATM? Like this one, in the corner of a Trader Joe’s parking lot. Shouldn’t it be a safe exception?
Despite not being in a branch office, there’s no way it could have a skimmer installed in it, is there? BoA’s technology must certainly be able to detect any tampering, right? You know what’s coming.
Of course it was hacked, and of course the card’s data was skimmed and stolen. Or, perhaps, a WiFi webcam had been planted in a strategic spot. Literally the only use of my debit card over the past year was one time at that ATM. Yesterday, my phone buzzed with this message.
Checking my e-mail, this was what I saw. There’s no reason to hide the last four digits of the card. It was deactivated within half an hour of my seeing the notices, and a new card is being sent to me by Bank of America.
The tiny amount of the withdrawal from my checking account was a typical tryout to see if the account could be exploited. The bank said it had been set up as a recurring payment, and I assume the next charge would have been for substantially more. The company name behind the crime is a legitimate business in England, and it’s undoubtedly also a victim of this fraud.
That sucks. When it rains, it pours, it seems.