Is it possible for scammers to withdraw money from bank accounts using no cards?

[adrock1976]

To save clogging up the "Paper Tickets v E-tickets" thread (where the below post was made)

Even the most basic of mobile phones inherently tracks its movements. It has to regularly report its location to ‘the system’ to enable calls to be routed to it. Similarly, if you are on the internet on any device (and you must be to be posting on here) your activities are being tracked. You are on CCTV in loads of places. Do you ever use a card to pay for anything? All the above can be put together to track you in quite some detail if someone with access to it all really wanted to. The point is for 99.999% of the population, nobody does. Your anonymity comes from that rather than any efforts to avoid tracking.

I understand that people are suspicious of tracking but there really is a lot of misunderstanding about it. Usually originating in the more lurid newspapers and nonsense on social media. The same goes for online banking. Regardless of what the Daily Mail or You and Yours will have you believe, hackers cannot empty your account at the touch of a button. Despite this many people believe they can and treat it with suspicion.

I am a recent convert to Etickets and I love them, purely for the convenience. The last one I bought was a Keighley to Leeds single on Tuesday. I bought it half an hour before departure while still sat on the KWVR train and it was a Northern last minute advance - £3 vs the £5.40 a walk up ticket would have cost. My alternatives would have been to pay by card at the station so trackable, or find a cashpoint locally and withdraw cash to pay so the withdrawal location would be recorded and my subsequent movements almost certainly on CCTV.

If, for whatever reason, you want to avoid being tracked it takes a lot more effort than not having a smartphone, just ask a drug dealer! Avoiding smartphones just denies you the many benefits and gives you minimal extra privacy.

The bit I bolded above:

Could it be explained how someone had made a few transactions at a company called Dunelms (I have never heard of them - it transpired it is a home furnishings store - the nearest two to me being in Lothian Region (either Bathgate or Livingston) and in Renfrewshire (Paisley)) on the exact same day transactions were made when I was at Glasgow Royal Infirmary undergoing cardiac tests being injected with iodine and lying down on a machine that bombarded me with gamma radiation?

Nobody knows my bank details, I do not have my password written down, I do not store or save bank or card details on my computer or phone, and I am the only person who uses the computer and phone. Also, I had my bank card on me that day, and I have never ever lent it to anybody else in my life.

Fortunately, when I went into my local bank branch and shown the appointment I had at The Royal, it was ascertained that it was impossible for me to be in two places at once and had the money refunded, plus a new card issued with the previous one being cancelled.

 

[AlterEgo]

Sounds like you simply had your card or its contactless features cloned to me. In this case they didn’t “withdraw money” as per the thread title but rather used your details to pay for goods.

 

[najaB]

Could it be explained how someone had made a few transactions at a company called Dunelms (I have never heard of them - it transpired it is a home furnishings store - the nearest two to me being in Lothian Region (either Bathgate or Livingston) and in Renfrewshire (Paisley)) on the exact same day transactions were made when I was at Glasgow Royal Infirmary undergoing cardiac tests being injected with iodine and lying down on a machine that bombarded me with gamma radiation?

As @AlterEgo says, making a transaction and withdrawing funds directly from your account are two completely different things (though, admittedly, the result is that your balance is reduced either way). The transaction could have been made in store with a cloned card, or it might have been made online using stolen details. In either case you did the correct thing: inform the bank immediately so that they can cancel the card and attempt to track the person(s) using it.

Sounds like you simply had your card or its contactless features cloned to me. In this case they didn’t “withdraw money” as per the thread title but rather used your details to pay for goods.

Most likely to be the magnetic stripe - cloning the chip or contactless is beyond the whit of the kind of criminal who's going to be shopping in Dunelm Mill.

 

[GusB]

To save clogging up the "Paper Tickets v E-tickets" thread (where the below post was made)



The bit I bolded above:

Could it be explained how someone had made a few transactions at a company called Dunelms (I have never heard of them - it transpired it is a home furnishings store - the nearest two to me being in Lothian Region (either Bathgate or Livingston) and in Renfrewshire (Paisley)) on the exact same day transactions were made when I was at Glasgow Royal Infirmary undergoing cardiac tests being injected with iodine and lying down on a machine that bombarded me with gamma radiation?

Nobody knows my bank details, I do not have my password written down, I do not store or save bank or card details on my computer or phone, and I am the only person who uses the computer and phone. Also, I had my bank card on me that day, and I have never ever lent it to anybody else in my life.

Fortunately, when I went into my local bank branch and shown the appointment I had at The Royal, it was ascertained that it was impossible for me to be in two places at once and had the money refunded, plus a new card issued with the previous one being cancelled.

Sounds like you simply had your card or its contactless features cloned to me. In this case they didn’t “withdraw money” as per the thread title but rather used your details to pay for goods.

As @AlterEgo says, it sounds as if you've had your card cloned. While I've never had it happen to me personally, I did read in the local paper that one of the regular cash machines that I used had been targeted by "skimmers". To be on the safe side I contacted my bank and was issued with a new card with a completely different number to the one I had before.

"Skimming" basically involves installing a device over the card slot (this reads your card details) and a camera above the keypad (which records your PIN). From there the fraudsters can create a new card.

It's always a good idea when you are withdrawing cash from an ATM to check that nothing seems unusual. Unfortunately there are some unscrupulous retailers out there too and it's not so easy to check the equipment that they're using. In any case, if you spot any suspicious activity with your account you should contact your bank. If they're on the ball, they should contact you anyway; this is what happened when I suddenly had a larger than usual amount of money deposited and then withdrawn from my account (quite legitimately) last year.

 

[PeterC]

A couple of general points, which are not directly relevant to the OP's case.

1. I have had plenty of legitimate transactions where the location quoted doesn't match the store location. Sometimes the business name is differet too.
2. Transactions are occasionally dated a day or two later.
You can sometimes appear to be in two places at once.

Card details are traded, I have never been to the USA but somebody once tried to make a purchase in Florida with a clone of my credit card. In that case the card company spotted it and stopped the card immediately. Annoyingly the letter telling me this arrived just after I had left home to take my mother out to lunch. Guess which card I tried to use to pay the bill.

 

[farleigh]

When using a cash machine, use a 'dummy' press on another number or two.

Should defeat any camera scans for your pin.

 

[Bevan Price]

When using a cash machine, use a 'dummy' press on another number or two.

Should defeat any camera scans for your pin.

And if available, use an ATM inside a bank, rather than one on an external wall. It is less likely to have been tampered with.