Fraud Activity - Looking for Help/Info...PLEASE READ

[ToxicToastKatz]

Hey Fellow Geekers,

I have got a serious question that I'm hoping someone WAYYYY smarter than me can shed some light on. I'll try to be brief:

About a month ago, I was having issues with my Hero. After spending a week of troubleshooting w/ the help of Sprint Tech Support over the phone, it was determined that my phone was malfunctioning and that it was faulty hardware. I was sent a refurb and sent the defective one back in the Sprint supplied envelope. I tracked the package on their website and it arrived safely and was logged in as such.

About a week after that, my wife's Touch Pro wasn't holding a charge, so I took it over to the local Sprint repair location and asked them to take a look at it. They stated that the battery was fine, but would order me another one because I stated it just wasn't holding a charge. They weren't able to order a battery, but were instead able to offer a refurb Touch Pro 2 (we have insurance on both phones, BTW). I accepted and two days later, we made the swap.

I don't remember the exact dates of the exchanges, but it was in late March/early April (I believe right around Opening Day for MLB).

Then, on April 10th and 11th, I started received odd international phone calls and my phone was acting strange. Two of the callers left messages in foreign languages. I kept the messages on my phone because I thought it was rather odd, but never really thought much of it. I received a few more calls from the same number and programmed it into my phone so I could check the option under the contact to "Send all calls directly to voicemail" so as not to be bothered by obvious wrong numbers. A few days later, my wife received an odd international call at 6am. This was the only call of that nature. Naturally, we thought nothing of it after the fact.

Fast forward to today. My wife calls me at work and asks if I changed something in our calling plan, because she's been unable to call her brother in San Diego (long distance call) and was unable to call a friend long distance last week. I advised her to call Sprint Tech, because something appeared wrong with her phone.

I get a call back from my wife 10 minutes later, explaining to me that Sprint Tech advised her that our numbers (both mine and hers) had been flagged beginning on April 10th for suspected fraudulent activity. Apparently, someone had made $1300 worth of international phone calls between our numbers and an automatic long distance call restriction was placed on our numbers. Neither my wife nor I were ever notified of the restriction, or the suspected fraudulent activity. Had my wife not tried to call long distance, we would have never known.

I called Sprint Customer Service (as their Fraud department is closed until Monday) and they were amazed that nobody had notified us of the restriction. They were also unable to shed any light as to how this could have happened or WHY we were never notified. The customer service rep than asked if I knew a particular man they had listed in as calling in about the account (albeit, calling about a different number....I have NO idea what that's about), and I had not.

I am fairly concerned over this, as I can't get any information as to how this could have happened, or if any more of my information is vulnerable.

For instance, is there a possible scenario where whoever is responsible for the calls could get my SS#? How about access to my phone's contents? I have no idea how a phone gets cloned, what that involves, or what accesses someone could get by doing that, so I'm' hoping someone here, either a tech savvy person, a Sprint Rep or someone who has experience with this (not the actual cloning, but a victim or fraud). Is cloning the only way that these calls could have been made? Is it a mere coincidence that after owning a cell phone for over 10 years and being with Sprint for 6, I am a victim of fraud not more than 2 weeks after swapping out 2 defective phones? Could someone at Sprint have used the ESNs from the defective devices?

Again, I am sorry to be so long winded, but I am truly concerned about this and anyone who can shed some light and provide any possible information would really help me out.

TIA

[D/\SH]

this happened to me and i got a letter from sprint stating that my information was sold.... i have over 50,000 woth of phones and devices shipped out without being notified and than on top of it they were all to different states and some after the highest level fraud alert was placed. they stated a random name called and made the changes and knew all the info. the best thing to do is start with changing your online password, your voicemail password, and your security information through sprint..... you may have to fight to have them cover the charges but dont give u and ask for escalated if needed. good luck and let me know if you need some more details i got you

[ToxicToastKatz]

Originally Posted by D/\SH

this happened to me and i got a letter from sprint stating that my information was sold.... i have over 50,000 woth of phones and devices shipped out without being notified and than on top of it they were all to different states and some after the highest level fraud alert was placed. they stated a random name called and made the changes and knew all the info. the best thing to do is start with changing your online password, your voicemail password, and your security information through sprint..... you may have to fight to have them cover the charges but dont give u and ask for escalated if needed. good luck and let me know if you need some more details i got you

Yea, it's not really going to be an issue with Sprint as far as charges go. These are clearly fraudulent in nature, so I am not worried about that. My main concern is that other information (SS#, bank accounts, etc) could be vulnerable. My guess is, that anything those responsible could have used to either clone a phone or access whatever it is they needed to make those calls wouldn't be tied to any of my financial stuff or my SS#, but I'm still concerned.

My wife changed the password and pin while she was on the phone w/ the Sprint Techs the first time.

[bradart]

Originally Posted by ToxicToastKatz

Yea, it's not really going to be an issue with Sprint as far as charges go. These are clearly fraudulent in nature, so I am not worried about that. My main concern is that other information (SS#, bank accounts, etc) could be vulnerable. My guess is, that anything those responsible could have used to either clone a phone or access whatever it is they needed to make those calls wouldn't be tied to any of my financial stuff or my SS#, but I'm still concerned.

My wife changed the password and pin while she was on the phone w/ the Sprint Techs the first time.

Really, there's not much they can do aside from access things directly relevant to your phone. They most likely have your ESN, phone number, and online Sprint account info but, past that, they are pretty limited. Sprint is pretty smart about banking information and even a breach of this nature won't lead to your ss# or bank accounts to be in danger (Unless the person doing this is in a position of very high authority at sprint [extremely unlikely]). Rest assured, there is no way to remotely access a phone and look at stuff. You're safe in that respect.

I recommend using this website for passwords: http://randomkeygen.com

Good luck, and i hope sprint is cool about this. Keep us updated.

[ToxicToastKatz]

@Bradart,

Yea, I don't think I'll have a problem with regards to Sprint as far as charges go. I tried to look at my online stuff and it's apparently locked, but I was able to see my minute usage on pageonce....yea, they racked up some big time minutes!!

Either way, thanks for the info, it does put my mind a little more at ease, but I'm a little troubled as to why Sprint never alerted me, and a little leery because this happened really close to the time that my wife and I had our phones replaced for hardware issues.

Anyway, I'll definitely update this after I get more info on Monday.

If anyone else has any info on this, I'd love the input. And Bradart, thanks for that website link, I"m going to check that out for sure.