WARNING - Betfair account hacked / fraud

[to75ne]

I contacted BF regarding my rogue IP addresses, and they were surprisingly helpful and quick with responding.

With regards to your account though, I'm astonished that BF's security department are not concerned about somebody in Lithuania trying to access your account.

so was i, and quite angry about it. betfair refunded, its a loss they suffered, so i am hoping that behind the scenes they colate all such info, and try and catch these people or pass it on to the relevant authority. the fella that i spoke too probably not in his remit to know too much about these things, and just trying his best i assume.

jeff, i dont think these hacker types give a flying feck about a phone call from one of their civil servants somehow. for that matter i doubt if a lithuanian civil servant would be concerned to much about my betfair account considering the way their economey is going, i assume its going down the pan like everyone else.

[Ferru123]

jeff, i dont think these hacker types give a flying feck about a phone call from one of their civil servants somehow.

True, but they might get worried if the local police turn up on the door. I wasn't suggesting that you get an embassy diplomat to reason with them!

I suspect that the authorities in Lithuania aren't as obsessed about human rights as we are in the UK!

Anyway, it can't hurt (although really your local constabulary should be taking the matter up with Interpol or the Lithuanian authorities, and I'd be inclined to make a complaint about their failure to do so, if I were you).

Jeff

[to75ne]

the person at the part time police station is not a proper copper. and as i have been refunded, they did not seem to understand that it is still theft, and i dont like anyone stealing from me irrospective of whether i am out of pocket or betfair is out of pocket. theft is theft. someone dipped my account.

i signed a statement and was given a crime number, and i will be surprised if i hear anything else about it.

[andyfuller]

I agree BF need to upgrade their security and think this issue has been raised in several Q&A sessions. But before we go slagging them off to much, are they any worse than the other bookmakers?

Also you can see why the criminals try their hand at this kind of stuff. Check out this story:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14989264

[Euler]

Just had somebody in touch today who has lost £6.5k from their account in similar circumstances. Basically the fraudster emptied their account. Time for Betfair to beef up security I think. I'll keep in touch with them to see what happens but it's with the Betfair fraud team at the moment.

[Ferru123]

There must be some low-cost security measures Betfair could introduce.

For example, they could make it so customers had to enter a pin if they wanted to make a withdrawl. If they wanted a new pin, they'd have to click a link in an email. That way, a frauster would need to have access to someone's email account and their Betfair account to steal money from them.

Jeff

[Euler]

Given the security breach they had themselves, I think they need a challenge response system when you log on or something.

[LeTiss 4pm]

I'm getting paranoid about these stories

I'd be interested to know if these victims had anything in common, like transferring money between wallets etc.

I also agree that other bookies have problems. 3 years ago, I opened an account with Expekt.com, in order to take advantage of a massive arb. I needed to email or fax a copy of my debit card (supposedly for security reasons!), which I did. 2 days later, some bastard in London spent £900 on my card. My bank returned the money thankfully, however Expekt totally ignored my complaints. It just seemed a huge coincidence if it wasn't a problem with their website security.

[andyfuller]

This issue has been rumbling for a few years now and nothing seems to have been done about it.

I think any measures would need to be done on the log in side as opposed to withdrawals as once you have access you can soon filter the money out without doing a withdrawal on the account.

[Ferru123]

How can you take money out without withdrawing it?

Maybe they should have a pin system that applies to transfers as well as withdrawls.

Another low cost security measure would be to do what some banks do, and rather than ask you for your password, ask you for (say) the 3rd, 5th and 1st characters in your password (changing what they ask for each time), as that would make things harder for key loggers.

Jeff

I think any measures would need to be done on the log in side as opposed to withdrawals as once you have access you can soon filter the money out without doing a withdrawal on the account.