Debit Card Fraud

[fergusmca]

My wife's bank contacted her today re. possible fraud on her Debit card. As it turns out, there were fraudulent transactions, two of them top-ups for O2. No PIN number was used in these transactions. How can you purchase a top-up without a PIN? Surely the authorities can trace the phone numbers concerned and therefore the culprit? Or is it not as simple as that?

By the way full credit to AIB for spotting this quickly.

[Buenchico]

>>>Surely the authorities can trace the phone numbers concerned and therefore the culprit? Or is it not as simple as that?

Many (probably most) pay-as-you-go phone users never register their SIM card with the service provider, so there's no way of linking the number to the user. A new SIM card typically costs just a quid from a supermarket, discount store or corner shop. Once you've got one you can top it up by buying a voucher from the same outlets using a (cloned) contactless debit card (so no PIN is required).