Help. My mom made a huge mistake on FB

[airbiscuit]

Once the smoke has cleared, can you give us and update - What worked, what didn't, what was frustrating, ... advice you would give to others facing the same situation?

 

[grsthegreat]

My mother had the same scams pulled on her when she was alive. all traced back to facebook. Luckily my sister intervened and stopped payments. We got facebook removed from her computer, never had another issue.

 

[crashz]

Good luck Eddie and assure your Mom that it happens to everybody. Happened to me in August and I'm not elderly yet. Just recently had a an application for a paycheck loan too. The advice earlier in the thread was spot on. Freeze the credit agencies (all three) and ChexSystem also does a credit freeze for checking accounts so that nobody can open a new account. I signed up for LifeLock in August and that has been a big help.

One thing I noticed is that the financial institutions have been very helpful and easy to work with. But it seems like nobody can stop this stuff from happening. Makes you want to go back to cash only.

 

[dmccarty]

We have had our credit history locked down for years. It is a PITA when we need to have have a credit check done, but that does not happen too often, and it is nothing compared to the trouble we would have if our identity was stolen.

My wife's identity was stolen years ago, it had to have been from an old file kept in a doctors office....

We still have charges show up on credit cards from time to time that we have to deal with, and we have had to get new credit cards, but that is not that bad.

Years ago, a coworker, who should have known better had a network router with a USB connection which they used to access a portable hard drive. They had tax information on the hard drive, the router was hacked and their identity stolen. Major PITA.

• Lock down the credit history.(EVERYONE SHOULD HAVE THEIR CREDIT HISTORY LOCKED DOWN)
• Notify the credit card companies.
• Notify the bank(s).
• Notify the IRS.
• Notify Social Security.
• Notify Insurance companies.
• Notify Medicare

We also have a bank account which we use for transactions where we do not think the receiver of the money has good security. We transfer the amount of money needed into that account to pay the bill.

It is criminal that these criminals get away with these crimes, well, and so many others.

Later,
Dan

 

[EddieWalker]

Eddie,

Very sorry to hear this... it happens to many.

Beside the things you mentioned above make sure you put a Credit Freeze with all 3 Credit Bureaus (Equifax / Experian / TransUnion) on their accounts. It will stop unwanted credit checks & account from being opened....

Here is some info & Links

Equifax: Call 800-349-9960 or go online.

Experian: Call 888‑397‑3742 or go online.

TransUnion: Call 888-909-8872 or go online.

You can also freeze your credit report at two lesser-known credit bureaus that may have information about you:

Innovis: Call 800-540-2505 or go online.

National Consumer Telecom & Utilities Exchange: Call 866-343-2821 or go online.


Also notify all CC companies & make sure there are no easy or common (across multiple accounts) passwords used...


Hoping for the Best,
Dennis

Thank you to everyone for your help and advice. I really appreciate the list of agencies to call and the phone numbers.

I called the Sheriff's office first this morning and filed a report. The Deputy gave me a case number and said to call the 3 Credit Bureaus, just like suggested. I called Equifax fist because they where first on the list. After going through a long interaction with their computer answering machine, I eventually got to a real person in India. He said that there is no reason to call the other companies, that they are required to provide the information to them, and all three would put a Fraud Alert on my Mom's credit. I have a confirmation number and he said that a letter will be mailed to her with all the information on it.

Then I called her bank and they put an alert on my parents account to watch for unusual activity.

After doing that, my parents felt comfortable calling their other accounts themselves and they are doing that now.

I told my mom to carry cash with her when she goes shopping in case her card is declined. They like to use their cards so they get rewards and discounts, then pay it off at the end of the month. They never carry a balance or make payments. I'm not sure if their card will work or if alert will go off. They both have cell phones, but they never use them and they never answer them. They only use them for emergencies to call me or my wife.

I suggested to them that they talk to their Priest and see if he could mention it at service. If she fell for it, then there might be others that will fall for it too. Especially if they are using fake profiles of other members of the church to gain somebodies confidence.

Now we will just wait and see what happens.

 

[JethroB]

On freezing credit files at the big three bureaus. The amount of junk mail offering
pre-approved credit cards, loans, life insurance, etc. will slow to a trickle. The big three make money from selling our info but by federal law a freeze should stop this practice.

 

[ruffdog]

.....and all three would put a Fraud Alert on my Mom's credit. I have a confirmation number and he said that a letter will be mailed to her with all the information on it.

A credit FREEZE will protect them much more than an alert.

 

[BleedingOrange]

Personally, I would have a real hard time trusting or believing anyone on the end of a phone line from India. I would be doing all the contacting of the various companies required myself, to know to was actually done. It appears to me that a lot of these scams originate in India.

 

[BigBlue1]

I was recently in a similar situation after finding out someone falsely filed an unemployment claim in my state with my info. I didn't 'lose' my information but some company that has it (including SSN) must have. Here are some of the mitigations I found were important to guarding your identity after such an event:

- File a police/sheriff report
- File a report with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) about identity theft (IdentityTheft.gov)
- File a report with the IRS and add an ID PIN (personal ID number) to your account so nobody can file a tax return as you
- Contact all 3 credit reporting bureaus and 'freeze' your credit report. This will block any attempts to pull your report. It will require you to log in and 'suspend' the freeze when you actually do need that capability (such as when you apply for credit somewhere).
- Consider filing a 'fraud alert' with the credit bureaus which adds additional alerting on their end about future interactions
- Look into LifeLock or other identity protection services

 

[crashz]

Eddie - I got the paycheck loan alert from LifeLock at 12:10 one night and it had the suggested steps for the credit freeze in the app as well as links to each agency. I was able to freeze all agencies as well as ChexSystem within 20 minutes. But I never saw anywhere that they communicated the freeze to each other. It won't take long to do, but I suggest you go to each website and make sure each agency is frozen. This is so common that it is right on the front page for each one like a convivence lane.