An Evansville, Kentucky woman is in jail, after police said they found over $200,000 in stolen gift cards inside her home. According to police, the woman presented false information to a Kroger grocery store and attempted to purchase gift cards by obtaining a line of credit using her employer’s name.
I am surprised that she was able to purchase such a large amount of gift cards without anyone becoming suspicious, especially since the purchases happened over a 2-3 month period. Click here for the full story.
Secret Credit Card Recording & Gift Card Windfall
As I mentioned on May 10th, in celebration of the newly redesigned giftcardblogger.com, I will be running a four part series on Gift Card Fraud and Scams.
I will be discussing the major types of gift card scams out there and provide you with tips on how to avoid becoming a victim. Today’s post will focus on credit card skimming and how that is used to perpetrate gift card fraud.
A recent arrest of two men in Herkimer, NY has led police into what could be one of the most sophisticated gift card and credit card schemes out there. According to a story on uticoad.com, police seized about 100 debit and gift cards from the two men, which were apparently used to defraud local Wal-Mart stores.
The case began to unfold as one of the men tried to buy $800 in Wal-Mart gift cards using multiple credit cards that were each denied. Police found that during the two day period, the suspects had purchased $39,000 worth of Wal-Mart gift cards and electronic equipment in Herkimer and Rome, NY. At the Rome, NY Wal-Mart alone, the two men made about $8,000 in purchases in one hour. So how does the scheme work? Read the rest of this entry »
Gift cards are more popular than ever, and with their increased acceptance comes a surge in gift card fraud. Over the last few years, a secondary market has sprung up targeted at unused gift cards, providing several options for customers to unlock the value in their gift card. These sites allow customers to swap gift cards, sell them for cash, or donate them to charity. Before you buy a gift card from one of these sites, here are five (5) tips you should know.
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Over the last several weeks, there has been a number of stories about gift card fraud, including this one from Missouri and this story from New Jersey. These stories have one thing in common: Stolen credit cards being used to buy gift cards, which are sometimes resold online for cash (a form of money laundry). In some cases, like the Missouri story above, the credit cards are stolen from another state and used to buy merchandise, which are then shipped to the home state of the perpertrators. This is all done to make tracing the transactions more difficult for law enforcement.
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That Target gift card you plan to mail to your niece in college may never get there if the envelope containing the card is not properly sealed or sturdy. According to the U.S. Postal Service (USPS), often times during the mail sorting process, gift cards are forced out of their envelopes, and onto the Post Office floor.
A Mesa, Arizona woman recently lost a $100 Best Buy gift card she mailed at a local post office. She found out when a check that was mailed with the gift card was returned to her in a postal service envelope. When she followed-up with the post office, they showed her the original envelope with a slit on the side, apparently roughed-up by the conveyor belt used in sorting the mail. And the $100 gift card? Nowhere to be found. The full amount was used up by someone a week later. Read the rest of this entry »
