I was just reading the thread about the stolen cc recently, and lo and behold, this morning I discovered a pending charge of over $4500 on my card that I didn't make!
I ended up reporting it as fraud and the card is cancelled, but thinking about it afterwards, something doesn't make sense to me: the charge was listed as "Archway Mktg*porsche". When I called the bank, they said there was a phone number associated with the charge, which I wrote down. I did a search and discovered it's the phone number of Porsche Cars North America (that's the actual legitimate US branch of the German car maker). I called them, and they said they didn't know anything about this charge, and it doesn't look like anything they would do, and that I should probably report it as fraud (which I then did).
But how could it have ended up under their phone number if it wasn't them? I was under the impression that the merchant has to authenticate with the credit card company or bank to make a charge, and therefore credit card fraud always happens on the other side (between the customer and merchant). But in this case they were basically telling me that someone managed to make a fake charge to me using their phone number. Is that possible?
I'm concerned because if they're wrong in saying that they didn't know anything about the charge, then I'm afraid someone could have taken out a lease or a loan in my name (the amount was about right for a 24 month plan on a 100K car). I froze my credit with all the reporting agencies just in case. Can anyone explain how this kind of fraud works?
I ended up reporting it as fraud and the card is cancelled, but thinking about it afterwards, something doesn't make sense to me: the charge was listed as "Archway Mktg*porsche". When I called the bank, they said there was a phone number associated with the charge, which I wrote down. I did a search and discovered it's the phone number of Porsche Cars North America (that's the actual legitimate US branch of the German car maker). I called them, and they said they didn't know anything about this charge, and it doesn't look like anything they would do, and that I should probably report it as fraud (which I then did).
But how could it have ended up under their phone number if it wasn't them? I was under the impression that the merchant has to authenticate with the credit card company or bank to make a charge, and therefore credit card fraud always happens on the other side (between the customer and merchant). But in this case they were basically telling me that someone managed to make a fake charge to me using their phone number. Is that possible?
I'm concerned because if they're wrong in saying that they didn't know anything about the charge, then I'm afraid someone could have taken out a lease or a loan in my name (the amount was about right for a 24 month plan on a 100K car). I froze my credit with all the reporting agencies just in case. Can anyone explain how this kind of fraud works?