My mother has Amazon Prime. A few days ago, someone had tried to fraudulently charge over $500 on one of her credit cards. She took care of it with her CC company. She wasn't sure exactly where it was charged at first. Not until she looked at her Amazon account and noticed several other cards under other people's names were added to her account. Several cards each under different peoples' names.
I helped her change her password, but I want to do more than just let the fraudster(s) get off the hook.
Random people have added their credit cards to my mother's Amazon account after also trying to charge her card. How to bring them to justice.
byu/Critical-Ad-407 inpersonalfinance
Posted by Critical-Ad-407
14 Comments
They’re probably in a different country.
>I want to do more than just let the fraudster(s) get off the hook.
Your mother can file a police report, and then you can both move on with your lives knowing that the fraudsters will almost certainly get off the hook. They likely are not physically located in the US, and even if they are, whether to prosecute this particular crime isn’t a decision that you get to make.
Set up a strong password and 2FA.
You don’t. It’s unlikely the fraudsters are even in your country, and law enforcement doesn’t have the resources to pursue $500 online frauds where the credit card company is going to eat it anyways.
Report the fraud, cancel the card, change all account passwords, be sure credit is frozen, and move on.
You should probably take down those names and card numbers and use them on the police report
You should probably take down the names and card numbers and include them when submitting a police report
She need to go through ALL her accounts and change the password to any site where she uses the same password.
My theory is that with an established Amazon, etc account they are less likely to flag it as fraud vs if the criminals use a new account to try to use their stolen cards.
If she resolved, as in disputed, through her bank she may find her Amazon account locked. The best action would have been attempt to cancel the order ASAP.
Add 2FA so that she has to enter a code when she logs in. Just in case someone figures out a way around the new password.
not just change passwords. that is a first step. add 2fa. annnnd go thru security tab and review all the approved devices and logins.
You can’t do anything those other cards are stolen as well.
Call Amazon service to report unauthorized account activity, and leave them to investigate it.
If the account is compromised again after changing the password, there is some other threat to the web browser, the computer, or your mother’s communications.
She likely uses a weak reused password for her Amazon account. Any other accounts with the same or similar passwords are at risk, especially email account and financial accounts.
Check her computer for virus and key loggers also.
The criminals do not live in the same country as you do.