Claim: Best Buy needs you to submit your credit card information to confirm a possibly fraudulent transaction.
Status: False.
Example: [Collected on the Internet, 2003]
BestBuy Order #1095619. Fraud Alert. Dear customer, Recently we have received an order made by using your personal credit card information. This order was made online at our official BestBuy website on 06/17/2003. Our Fraud Department has some suspicions regarding this order and we need you to visit a special Fraud Department page at our web store where you can confirm or decline this transaction by providing us with the correct This e-mail address has been taken from National Credit Bureau. Click the link below to visit a special Fraud Department page to resolve the cause of the problem. ===================================================================== ITEMS PURCHASED The order listed above has not yet been processed. - UNVERIFIED SHIPPING ADDRESS - Information provided: In our effort to deter fraudulent transactions, we need your help in ===================================================================== |
Origins: Like the PayPal scam, this message is a trap set to lure the unwary into disclosing their credit card information to strangers who would like to put that information to profitable (and illegal)
use.
This scam comes in the guise of a message supposedly mailed out by
Of course, Best Buy has nothing to do with the sending out of this warning, and the information about an unauthorized charge is false. The message is bait intended to lure the reader into clicking the provided link, which takes the reader not to
The giveaways to this scam are that:
- There is no such organization as the "National Credit Bureau."
- The major national credit bureaus (Equifax, Trans Union and Experian) do not maintain databases of
e-mail addresses which they provide to merchants to help validate transactions. A merchant needing to verify a credit card transaction would contact the financial institution that issued the card in order to obtain more information. - The link embedded in the message does not take the user to a "special Fraud Department page" on Best Buy's site, but to a page hosted under a completely different domain name (such as digitalgamma.com or
your-instant-credit-reporter.org) - The message did not issue from an "@bestbuy.com" address (or the address of any company which performs services on behalf of Best Buy).
Best Buy sent the following message to registered customers and posted a similiar notice on their web site:
IMPORTANT: E-MAIL HOAX NOTIFICATION Late Wednesday afternoon, June 18, 2003, Best Buy became aware of an unauthorized and deceptive Best Buy is working with the appropriate law enforcement authorities to quickly resolve the situation. We are working to shut down sites affiliated with that unauthorized No Best Buy systems have been compromised, and our online business is secure. The privacy of your personal information is of the utmost importance to Best Buy and any information you provide to us is handled according to our Privacy Policy. As part of the preparation for the relaunch of BestBuy.com, online purchasing will be temporarily unavailable beginning Friday, If you have any questions, call Customer Care at 1-888-BEST BUY (237-8289) or visit our Online Pressroom. To find out more about protecting your information, visit the Federal Trade Commission's Identity Theft Web site at www.consumer.gov/idtheft.
Subject: Official Notification from Best Buy
Fraud Department. That message was NOT from Best Buy or any of our affiliates.
Last updated: 5 January 2008
Sources: