Financial News from a source you can trust |
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CONSUMER INFORMATION
Read the latest initiatives of the FTC
regarding protecting the right of Consumers here.
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Protect Yourself from Fraudulent Schemes & Identity Theft
*Email Identity Protection
* Ghost Terminals
* Consumer Information
EMAIL IDENTITY PROTECTION
Email is becoming an increasing vehicle for
fraud and identity theft these days. It is importnat to keep in mind that
your security is as important to us as it is to you.
Cintel wants to assure our members that federal financial
agencies do not use e-mail as a means of communicating requests for sensitive
personal information.In an ongoing effort to combat identity theft, several
tips developed by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) are listed below which
may help you protect yourself from becoming a victim of this latest scam.
- If you receive an e-mail that warns you, with little or no notice,
that an account of yours will be shut down unless you reconfirm your
billing information, you should not reply or click on the link in
the e-mail. Instead, you should contact the company cited in the e-mail
directly using a telephone number or website address you know to be
genuine.
- You should avoid e-mailing personal and financial information.
Before submitting financial information through a website, you should
look for the "lock" icon on the browser's status bar. Cintel
also suggests looking for "https" in the website address.
Both of these indicators signal the information is secure during transmission.
- You should review credit card and credit union account statements
as soon as you receive them to determine whether there are any unauthorized
charges. If the statement is late by more than a couple of days, you
should call the credit card company or Cintel to confirm your billing
address and account balances.
- You should report any suspicious activity to the FTC. Send the
actual spam to uce@ftc.gov. If you
believe you have been a victim of a fraudulent scheme, you should file
a complaint at www.ftc.gov. You can visit the FTC's Identity Theft Website
(www.ftc.gov/idtheft) to learn
how to minimize your risk of damage from identity theft.
Please remember neither Cintel nor any
other federal financial agency uses e-mail to request non-public information
such as account numbers, date of birth, or social security number.
GHOST TERMINALS
Ghost Terminals is a term referring to
a crime recently indicated to be occurring in Ohio and is a variation of
the credit card "skimming" scam.
- Fake touch pad screens are placed over legitimate
card readers and pin pads on existing ATMs using simple adhesive attachments
such as two-sided foam tape.
- Common equipment utilized in this crime include a
touch screen computer, a card reader, a pinhole camera above the terminal,
and a sign announcing that "options have changed."
- Cardholders using the "ghost terminal" swipe
their card and key in their pin number and subsequently receive a message
that the terminal is out of service.
- The information retrieved from the magnetic strip
on the card may then be used with the captured pin number to produce a
counterfeit card.
We encourage members to utilize surcharge-free Cintel
or Alliance One ATMs and, as much as possible, use the same series of ATMs
consistently. Be wary of using an ATM with temporary signage or an unfinished
appearance. If you receive an error message after using a suspicious ATM
please call our office immediately.
Should you have any questions please do not hestitate to
contact us.
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