Beware Of Fraud

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nickanderson

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I am not blaiming steam, but immediatly after I purchased CS:Source with my check card, over the last 3 days, there has been charges in the amount of 527 dollars against my checking account that after research have all been fraud. This could be a coincidence, but it happened right after, and I had not purchased anything in days before.

I just want to make you all aware, WATCH YOUR accounts very closely, weather it was debit, or credit card, there could be a security breach on steam.

One of the charges linked back to a pakistani telecom comany. The other was hollister clothing.

Please be very careful.

-- Nick
 
thats odd... , I think im ok though, havent had anny strange charges to my card.
 
Wow, more security breaches for Valve... GG....

But it could be from something else thou...
 
Thanks for the info Nick, I'm going to call my CC company now and make sure it hasn't been used since I ordered HL2 off of Steam
 
No problem, the person who got me aparently is from pakastan, at least thats what ive put together by tracking down the charges.
 
How the hell?

I can see Gabe Newell meeting a Pakistani guy in Hawaii with a suitcase containing all Steam member's CC details :)
 
That sucks. Are they gonna give you your money back? Hackers can take my $8.36 out of my checking account if they really want :p
 
Dude you probably had a keystroke virus on your pc. Sucks to be you. Better go do a reformat to take that trojan spyware off of your pc.
 
reformatting ist a temp solution. and you don't know for sure if you have had a troyan on your pc.

use a tool, like "spybot - search & destroy". it identifies & removes malware, immunize your system and updates itself, and that for free.
 
MaxiKana said:
Wow, more security breaches for Valve... GG....

But it could be from something else thou...
Click to expand...

Of course it's something else. Besides the billing isn't handled by Valve.

Good luck sorting this out Nick.
 
Darth Valium said:
reformatting ist a temp solution. and you don't know for sure if you have had a troyan on your pc.

use a tool, like "spybot - search & destroy". it identifies & removes malware, immunize your system and updates itself, and that for free.
Click to expand...
Don't listen to this guy. Now a days you almost have no choice but to reformat. I reformat once a month to make my pc run smooth and to delete all the crap off of my pc. I can do a reformat and install all progs that I use in less than an hour. I have a super old laptop with a dial up connection that I use to buy anything of the internet if there isn't some type of number to call to place an order. And that is all I use the laptop for. You can get viruses from jpegs, flash, sites that you visit without you even knowing, not to mention tons of other ways and places. Spyware and antivirus programs are hit and miss and don't do anything half the time. The only way to remove most virus is to start your pc in safe mode, then run certain antivirus progs to remove them but even that doesn't work half the time.
Do a reformat and tell me if your pc doesnt run faster and or smoother, and no popups. It's great. I am sorry for your loss but you should have some sort of internet fraud protection on your cc. If you do you will just have to go through some time to get it fixed.
 
VodkA-HLC- said:
Don't listen to this guy. Now a days you almost have no choice but to reformat. I reformat once a month to make my pc run smooth and to delete all the crap off of my pc. I can do a reformat and install all progs that I use in less than an hour. I have a super old laptop with a dial up connection that I use to buy anything of the internet if there isn't some type of number to call to place an order. And that is all I use the laptop for. You can get viruses from jpegs, flash, sites that you visit without you even knowing, not to mention tons of other ways and places. Spyware and antivirus programs are hit and miss and don't do anything half the time. The only way to remove most virus is to start your pc in safe mode, then run certain antivirus progs to remove them but even that doesn't work half the time.
Do a reformat and tell me if your pc doesnt run faster and or smoother, and no popups. It's great. I am sorry for your loss but you should have some sort of internet fraud protection on your cc. If you do you will just have to go through some time to get it fixed.
Click to expand...


Here is a concept... don't download the spyware/virus in the first place. Say NO not yes when you get a pop up.
 
Reformating is a great way to clean the comp. However, try using all the available spyware removal software you can find, like Adaware and Spy Bot Search and Destroy (like described above). Also, get an antivirus going with updated virus defininitions. Last, but certainly not least, get ZoneAlarm (the freeware) and install it.

I did all this last time along with some reg-clean stuff instead of reformatting and my machine runs great.

I hate to differ with Vodka saying that he reformats every month, cause we each deal with this mess in our own ways, but it is alot of work for some folks. If you stay updated on virus, spy ware and firewalls, you can save yourself some money, heartache and fraud.

Good luck getting your CC fixed!

Timech187
 
Dont worry guys i have been over my pc many of times, and I do not have any kind of virus or keylogger. It is possible that my wireless router was hacked I guess. I did the best I could setting up security (128 bit encription, disable ssid broadcast, firewall on, mac address lock down, ect.)

I am not pointing the blaim at anyone, just wanted to let everyone know to be on the lookout becouse I did not have ANY unknown transactions until about 4 hours after I bought CS: Source hl2 preorder.

Oh and yes wells fargo seems to be very good about giving you back your money. They shut down my checking account and reopened a new one, and disabled all my cards and are overnighting me new ones. Pretty good service in that respect, may take up to 30 days to get my money back, but they assured me that customers are never responsible for fraud. They have alot of insurance to cover this sort of thing.
 
HijackThis is good at picking stuff up also, just make sure you know what you're looking at because some of the things it finds you actually need :|
 
nickanderson said:
I am not blaiming steam, but immediatly after I purchased CS:Source with my check card, over the last 3 days, there has been charges in the amount of 527 dollars against my checking account that after research have all been fraud. This could be a coincidence, but it happened right after, and I had not purchased anything in days before.

I just want to make you all aware, WATCH YOUR accounts very closely, weather it was debit, or credit card, there could be a security breach on steam.

One of the charges linked back to a pakistani telecom comany. The other was hollister clothing.

Please be very careful.

-- Nick
Click to expand...

What kind of clothing from Hollister? I think that might have been me!
 
nickanderson said:
Young adult trendy clothes, you'll find the stores in fancy malls I guess.
Click to expand...

:| I meant, that might have been me using your credit card to purchase me clothes. DOH DOH!
 
timech187 said:
Reformating is a great way to clean the comp.
[...]
I hate to differ with Vodka saying that he reformats every month, cause we each deal with this mess in our own ways, but it is alot of work for some folks. If you stay updated on virus, spy ware and firewalls, you can save yourself some money, heartache and fraud.
Click to expand...

word on this. my actual wxp is 1.5 years old, reinstalled after a mayor hardware-change. as soon as you start to use your pc in a "serious" way, reformatting maybe still a great way, but it should be the ultimate way too.

some tips:

1. don't use outlook(the office one)
2. don't use ie; try firefox
3. perhaps don't use ms office at all, openoffice works great
4. before you reinstall, slipstream all actual sp's and hotfixes into your xp-install cd(search for howto's). without this your fesh installed xp is safe like a copy of hl2 thrown into a highschool-class.
5. install a 3rd party fw, like zone-alarm
6. install a av-software, best if it has a on-access-scan
7. use a anti-spy sw with immunize-feature, like the one mentioned before
8. to keep your os clean, use a removal-software like ccleaner, which keeps your registry clean and deletes bunches of unneeded files.
9. allways press "cancel" when js-popups appear, an never type "yes" when you asked to(disabling is an option too, but a lot of sites are still using it)

generally:
most of the stuff which potentially harms your pc comes from pasv- & warez-sites(including those offering no-cd's too), so stay away from them(if you can't stand the need to visit them, be carefull)
 
Edge said:
Here is a concept... don't download the spyware/virus in the first place. Say NO not yes when you get a pop up.
Click to expand...

You dont have to do anything to get a worm anymore.

Remember Blaster? The one that shut down your computer after 1 minute? - That spread to millions of computers in around 15 minutes, with no user interaction at all.
 
my pc wasn't affected, cause the fw blocked it.

immediately after i shut it down for testing-purposes, my pc was infected. restarted fw, run "shutdown -a", run blaster removal-tool, everything was fine. this has taken approx 1 minute. poor ones who reinstalled in cause of blaster :).

most of the time it's only a matter of the tools and hotfixes, if your pc will survive or not.


edit: there is no worm which install on your sys without a prior action.
 
I know that blaster was easy to remove, It's just an example of a worm that gets in by itself :)
 
That's why I have two VISA's. One VISA account just for purchase over the net. I never have more than a couple of bucks there unless I'm buying something of course
 
v1p3r said:
I know that blaster was easy to remove, It's just an example of a worm that gets in by itself :)
Click to expand...

that's the point. you had to access a webpage to got this worm. it didn't gets in by itself. and he had only a chance, when your fw was offline.
 
eep. Now you lot have made me paranoid lol.

When I purchased steam I had just gotten rid of a keylogger, which was quite lucky. No transactions on my CC yet, but then again they could have missed it I guess :D. Being in Wales an all, I don't think those pakistani monitor us :D (Maybe except for sheep population increases, I don't know)
 
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