Once they hack your account, they can de-authorize all of your machines and authorize all they want.
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I think my iTunes account was hacked?
- Thread starter iTone
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Once they hack your account, they can de-authorize all of your machines and authorize all they want.
I've also had my itunes account hacked. Got an email from BOA Friday morning saying that there was suspicious activity on my VISA. I went and looked, and there were about 10 charges from itunes, all in the realm of $40. BOA cancelled my card and is sending a new one.
But, when I just went to update some apps on my phone, it would not let me in. Said my user name did not exist. So I set up a new account with the same user name. But now it does not want me to download things because I don't have a major version????? Or that it cannot connect to the store.
Any thoughts on how to get me out of this ridiculous cycle.
I have, removed all pay sources from itunes.
But, when I just went to update some apps on my phone, it would not let me in. Said my user name did not exist. So I set up a new account with the same user name. But now it does not want me to download things because I don't have a major version????? Or that it cannot connect to the store.
Any thoughts on how to get me out of this ridiculous cycle.
I have, removed all pay sources from itunes.
My iTunes account also hijacked
Well, just like all the others, my iTunes account was hijacked. I tried to sign on and it wouldnt take my password. I wrote iTunes support and they quickly wrote back saying that my Apple id and password had been changed. they re-set it back to the correct name and when I went to change the temporary password they gave me, I found out that the person had also changed my secret question and answer and also my birth date. I had NO credit card or checkbook linked to my account (Thank God !) but they emptied my gift card account of almost all the remaining $25. They purchased Windows games- my computer is a Mac. So the question I have is how did they get my Apple ID and password? The only 2 ways I can think of is perhaps it was an inside job at Apple, or maybe THEIR computer was hacked and they got the info that way. In any case, I'm out $25 which Apple won't refund. I have 2 pieces of advice for people reading this. First, make sure your iTunes password is not the same as your email password, otherwise your mail might also be compromised as was your iTunes account. Second, and most important, remove all links in your iTunes account to your credit/debit card, or checking or PayPal account. Pay for any iTunes purchases with a gift card with a low price of $10. At least that way if your account is hijacked, all you will lose is at most $10. Its better than finding your credit card charged with fraudulent purchases and fighting with them to get the charges removed.
Well, just like all the others, my iTunes account was hijacked. I tried to sign on and it wouldnt take my password. I wrote iTunes support and they quickly wrote back saying that my Apple id and password had been changed. they re-set it back to the correct name and when I went to change the temporary password they gave me, I found out that the person had also changed my secret question and answer and also my birth date. I had NO credit card or checkbook linked to my account (Thank God !) but they emptied my gift card account of almost all the remaining $25. They purchased Windows games- my computer is a Mac. So the question I have is how did they get my Apple ID and password? The only 2 ways I can think of is perhaps it was an inside job at Apple, or maybe THEIR computer was hacked and they got the info that way. In any case, I'm out $25 which Apple won't refund. I have 2 pieces of advice for people reading this. First, make sure your iTunes password is not the same as your email password, otherwise your mail might also be compromised as was your iTunes account. Second, and most important, remove all links in your iTunes account to your credit/debit card, or checking or PayPal account. Pay for any iTunes purchases with a gift card with a low price of $10. At least that way if your account is hijacked, all you will lose is at most $10. Its better than finding your credit card charged with fraudulent purchases and fighting with them to get the charges removed.
Unfortunately I have to add myself to the parade of iTunes fraud cases in here.
I recently checked my credit card account activity online and found the same pattern described throughout this thread. Unauthorized iTunes charges that, for me, came out to about $188. First one was $1.29, then the next five were between $40 - $50 (although one was for $12.68), then another for $2.11 this month. So far seven charges in all before I caught it and closed down my account. Not sure if some are still in the pipeline.
No email receipts from iTunes that usually comes through my regular email acct -- nothing.
From what I researched since, the first small charge is just a test to see if the transaction went through. The rest follow if successful.
I'm single, live alone, and have up-to-date security software and theft identity protection on my computer. I have only one authorized computer, mine, and no one else has access to it. I've downloaded the occasional 99¢ song but mainly use iTunes for the free weekly promo. I know I haven't downloaded any pay songs the past few months and NEVER downloaded an app, ever.
Of course I immediately tried calling Apple with the number on my statement and got a prerecorded message throwing me to their online feedback support. I then tried sending them frantic messages about the problem but kept getting database errors. Not sure if they were updating their system at the time or what, but I couldn't wait and immediately called my cc company to dispute the charges. The cc rep cancelled my account, will create a new one and send me a new card. I have to fill out a fraud report they'll send, too, though considering what I've read in here I'm not optimistic what good it will do.
I was finally able to send Apple a message through their web site this morning, but since this is the weekend not sure when I'll get a reply.
I spelled out exactly what the problem was and told them in no uncertain terms that I will NOT pay the bogus charges no matter what their policy is. I told my cc company the same thing. They told me to circle the disputed charges and deduct them from my current statement when I send my payment in.
I also did the other fixes like change my iTunes payment method to 'none' and changed my password. Thankfully, none of my personal info looks hacked/changed.
What I want to know is how have people resolved this?
Have any of you gone through to its conclusion? If so were you forced to pay? If not, did Apple threaten to sue you? How did your cc company handle the matter when the dust settled? Did you have to fight with them, too.
I agree the cc company is caught in the middle since they're just the messenger and middleman in the transaction. Apple is the real culprit. This security issue has been going on for at least two years and nothing has changed in their policy to handle customer complaints or tighten up security? Ridiculous.
I know Mac users have forever dumped on IBM PCs and expressed how superior Mac products are, but one thing Apple is "definitely" NOT superior in is customer service. Absolutely Terrible!
I recently checked my credit card account activity online and found the same pattern described throughout this thread. Unauthorized iTunes charges that, for me, came out to about $188. First one was $1.29, then the next five were between $40 - $50 (although one was for $12.68), then another for $2.11 this month. So far seven charges in all before I caught it and closed down my account. Not sure if some are still in the pipeline.
No email receipts from iTunes that usually comes through my regular email acct -- nothing.
From what I researched since, the first small charge is just a test to see if the transaction went through. The rest follow if successful.
I'm single, live alone, and have up-to-date security software and theft identity protection on my computer. I have only one authorized computer, mine, and no one else has access to it. I've downloaded the occasional 99¢ song but mainly use iTunes for the free weekly promo. I know I haven't downloaded any pay songs the past few months and NEVER downloaded an app, ever.
Of course I immediately tried calling Apple with the number on my statement and got a prerecorded message throwing me to their online feedback support. I then tried sending them frantic messages about the problem but kept getting database errors. Not sure if they were updating their system at the time or what, but I couldn't wait and immediately called my cc company to dispute the charges. The cc rep cancelled my account, will create a new one and send me a new card. I have to fill out a fraud report they'll send, too, though considering what I've read in here I'm not optimistic what good it will do.
I was finally able to send Apple a message through their web site this morning, but since this is the weekend not sure when I'll get a reply.
I spelled out exactly what the problem was and told them in no uncertain terms that I will NOT pay the bogus charges no matter what their policy is. I told my cc company the same thing. They told me to circle the disputed charges and deduct them from my current statement when I send my payment in.
I also did the other fixes like change my iTunes payment method to 'none' and changed my password. Thankfully, none of my personal info looks hacked/changed.
What I want to know is how have people resolved this?
Have any of you gone through to its conclusion? If so were you forced to pay? If not, did Apple threaten to sue you? How did your cc company handle the matter when the dust settled? Did you have to fight with them, too.
I agree the cc company is caught in the middle since they're just the messenger and middleman in the transaction. Apple is the real culprit. This security issue has been going on for at least two years and nothing has changed in their policy to handle customer complaints or tighten up security? Ridiculous.
I know Mac users have forever dumped on IBM PCs and expressed how superior Mac products are, but one thing Apple is "definitely" NOT superior in is customer service. Absolutely Terrible!
My wife's iTunes account was recently hacked as well. Not sure how it happened, she's a skilled computer user, doesn't visit questionable websites, open suspicious emails or anything like that.
Thankfully no credit card was on the account, or, if there was one, it was expired at the time the account was hijacked. iTunes support sucks balls, email only. They finally reset her userid and password, allowing her access to her music again. We'll be upgrading the songs to the DRM free versions. Following that, all our music purchases are coming from Amazon MP3, not iTunes.
iTunes can suck it.
Thankfully no credit card was on the account, or, if there was one, it was expired at the time the account was hijacked. iTunes support sucks balls, email only. They finally reset her userid and password, allowing her access to her music again. We'll be upgrading the songs to the DRM free versions. Following that, all our music purchases are coming from Amazon MP3, not iTunes.
iTunes can suck it.
While browsing through Taobao (the eBay of China) I noticed a lot iTunes accounts were for sale for under $5. The sellers say that the accounts have $50 on them but that they have to be used within 24 hours. That would explain why people are getting charged in batches of $50: your account is probably being resold to many different people, each of whom gets told to buy up to $50 worth of things. One seller is even wholesaling batches of 20 accounts for the price of one. I tried reporting them but that website isn't as responsive as eBay when it comes to illegal activities.
all of this fraud business has led me to take my Credit card off itunes. When i want to purchase, I'll use a gift card. Well worth the time it seems to save all this trouble.
sorry this happened to all of you but thanks for helping me not get jacked also.
sorry this happened to all of you but thanks for helping me not get jacked also.
Ditto.
Same thing just happened to me yesterday morning, May 28. I was going to pay my rent, checked my bank account online to verify the balance, and noticed 4 transactions from itunes. 3 of the transactions were in the 40-55 dollar range, and the first one was a transaction for 1.00, possibly a feeler transaction? I immediately contacted my bank, locked my account, reported the fraud, filled out paperwork that was emailed to me by my bank, and faxed it back. I had the same problem contacting itunes by telephone, so i had to resort to email. I received a response from their support people stating the same thing that all the others have said. She suggested that i remove my credit card information from my account, but as of now, I'm unable to do so as another fraudulent transaction posted to itunes after i had cut my card off. I have already done all of the password/information changing that i have been able to do, but this is ridiculous. I could not even deauthorize the computers from accessing my itunes account as it was just my own and the person that stole from me. I rebooted into windows 7 through boot camp, authorized that, and luckily got my roommate and girlfriend to let me use their computers for a moment to make it to 5 to be able to deauthorize them all. I do not understand why we have to jump through all of these hoops to get simple things done. Every time in the past that i had to deal with apple, they were nothing short of amazing in fixing things that had gone awry, but their itunes department has definitely dropped the ball this time.
Same thing just happened to me yesterday morning, May 28. I was going to pay my rent, checked my bank account online to verify the balance, and noticed 4 transactions from itunes. 3 of the transactions were in the 40-55 dollar range, and the first one was a transaction for 1.00, possibly a feeler transaction? I immediately contacted my bank, locked my account, reported the fraud, filled out paperwork that was emailed to me by my bank, and faxed it back. I had the same problem contacting itunes by telephone, so i had to resort to email. I received a response from their support people stating the same thing that all the others have said. She suggested that i remove my credit card information from my account, but as of now, I'm unable to do so as another fraudulent transaction posted to itunes after i had cut my card off. I have already done all of the password/information changing that i have been able to do, but this is ridiculous. I could not even deauthorize the computers from accessing my itunes account as it was just my own and the person that stole from me. I rebooted into windows 7 through boot camp, authorized that, and luckily got my roommate and girlfriend to let me use their computers for a moment to make it to 5 to be able to deauthorize them all. I do not understand why we have to jump through all of these hoops to get simple things done. Every time in the past that i had to deal with apple, they were nothing short of amazing in fixing things that had gone awry, but their itunes department has definitely dropped the ball this time.
Because it is clear that some of you cant see the seriousness of the situation with the iTunes store, I am going to tell you the truth about what has been going on with your account.
Lets say you are a Chinese guy or girl with an iPhone or iPad and you want to get some music, movie or app. How you do you do it?
You go to http://www.taobao.com: The (by far) largest online market in the world and type iTunes in the search bar. Inmediately you will be presented with a list of more than 7,000 items.
You want to save money, so you filter the list to show only items under RMB25.00- (USD3.60) and still you have more than 3,600 offers.
So you pick some one at random like, as an example, this one:
http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=5516054242
You open the online chat and you transfer him RMB22.00 (USD3.20)
He ask you in the online chat to provide a new iTunes account name and password, and you comply:
User: qiuwge3foe3333@yahoo.com Passwd: qwer34567
He asks you to wait 10 minutes online. He has already a number of user accounts under surveillance, so he enters in the iTunes account of his victim, change his/her username and password to the one you provided, and come back to ask you try it and approve the trasaction so Taobao.com releases his money.
Even if you cant read Chinese you can see very clearly in his item description that this account will not last more than 24 hours (the time for his victim to see the charges mounting and then cancel the credit card).
He claims that he select his accounts so you can drain at least USD250.00 from them before they get cancelled. He urges you to be fast and buy and download as fast as you can. Start inmediately! Keep the download going on for the full 24 hours! There is no warranties on how long it will last!
Because he already changed the username and password, the victim cant stop you.
There are cheaper ways, of course! You can join a frenzy feeding, where the same hijacked account is sold to several customers. It is much slower and, because it was opened maybe hours ago, it will be much shorter lived. It can be had for RMB1.00 to RMB5.00 (USD 0.14 to USD 0.74).
The most important thing, however, is to BUY fast not to download fast. You can download at leisure during the next weeks. iTunes will not stop you: It will only remind you that your (victims) credit card is not working and invite you to update your payment details.
Then, if you want more applications later on, you just enter in Taobao.com and get again a new account in a few minutes.
This is the sad reality.
There are a lot of of things apple could do to stop this, like cancelling the hijacked accounts and deauthorizing its computers, making the whole process useless. But for what?
This is not a problem for Apple: It is a problem for the credit card industry. The account is right, the payment is right, end of the story. If you claim that someone used your credit card to buy things it is a problem between you and your bank, not between you and Apple!
Please note that when you are buying like crazy with your new account Apple doesnt bill directly to the credit card every time you add an item: It bills in batches of around (below) USD50. This is another detail that shows how cunning they are!
You buy, buy, and buy. And every time your reach 40-something dollars Apple invoices the card. If it pass, you can keep buying. If not, it stops you from buying more.
This achieves two things: One, it limits the damage to Apple as they only can get hooked for, at most, USD50.
Two, makes the whole system safer for them, as purchases under USD50 are not protected in the States law.
And it is funny that if that last transaction doesnt go through, then is when the rage of Apple comes over you for any item you may have already download before the invoicing point was reached.
Apple will put a flag on your account and will not allow you to download updates for any of the apps on your account (whatever order they came from) or download the pending episodes of your season passes).
In this case, you have no option but to go to Taobao.com and use another procedure.
There are people (the same people) who saves you time by doing in advance the whole process of providing the user, etc. Theyve already opened an account and used it to purchase one or two USD50.00 gift certificates. You get one (USD1.4) and use it to cover the debt with Apple so they can let you enjoy peacefully the items you own.
Lets say you are a Chinese guy or girl with an iPhone or iPad and you want to get some music, movie or app. How you do you do it?
You go to http://www.taobao.com: The (by far) largest online market in the world and type iTunes in the search bar. Inmediately you will be presented with a list of more than 7,000 items.
You want to save money, so you filter the list to show only items under RMB25.00- (USD3.60) and still you have more than 3,600 offers.
So you pick some one at random like, as an example, this one:
http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=5516054242
You open the online chat and you transfer him RMB22.00 (USD3.20)
He ask you in the online chat to provide a new iTunes account name and password, and you comply:
User: qiuwge3foe3333@yahoo.com Passwd: qwer34567
He asks you to wait 10 minutes online. He has already a number of user accounts under surveillance, so he enters in the iTunes account of his victim, change his/her username and password to the one you provided, and come back to ask you try it and approve the trasaction so Taobao.com releases his money.
Even if you cant read Chinese you can see very clearly in his item description that this account will not last more than 24 hours (the time for his victim to see the charges mounting and then cancel the credit card).
He claims that he select his accounts so you can drain at least USD250.00 from them before they get cancelled. He urges you to be fast and buy and download as fast as you can. Start inmediately! Keep the download going on for the full 24 hours! There is no warranties on how long it will last!
Because he already changed the username and password, the victim cant stop you.
There are cheaper ways, of course! You can join a frenzy feeding, where the same hijacked account is sold to several customers. It is much slower and, because it was opened maybe hours ago, it will be much shorter lived. It can be had for RMB1.00 to RMB5.00 (USD 0.14 to USD 0.74).
The most important thing, however, is to BUY fast not to download fast. You can download at leisure during the next weeks. iTunes will not stop you: It will only remind you that your (victims) credit card is not working and invite you to update your payment details.
Then, if you want more applications later on, you just enter in Taobao.com and get again a new account in a few minutes.
This is the sad reality.
There are a lot of of things apple could do to stop this, like cancelling the hijacked accounts and deauthorizing its computers, making the whole process useless. But for what?
This is not a problem for Apple: It is a problem for the credit card industry. The account is right, the payment is right, end of the story. If you claim that someone used your credit card to buy things it is a problem between you and your bank, not between you and Apple!
Please note that when you are buying like crazy with your new account Apple doesnt bill directly to the credit card every time you add an item: It bills in batches of around (below) USD50. This is another detail that shows how cunning they are!
You buy, buy, and buy. And every time your reach 40-something dollars Apple invoices the card. If it pass, you can keep buying. If not, it stops you from buying more.
This achieves two things: One, it limits the damage to Apple as they only can get hooked for, at most, USD50.
Two, makes the whole system safer for them, as purchases under USD50 are not protected in the States law.
And it is funny that if that last transaction doesnt go through, then is when the rage of Apple comes over you for any item you may have already download before the invoicing point was reached.
Apple will put a flag on your account and will not allow you to download updates for any of the apps on your account (whatever order they came from) or download the pending episodes of your season passes).
In this case, you have no option but to go to Taobao.com and use another procedure.
There are people (the same people) who saves you time by doing in advance the whole process of providing the user, etc. Theyve already opened an account and used it to purchase one or two USD50.00 gift certificates. You get one (USD1.4) and use it to cover the debt with Apple so they can let you enjoy peacefully the items you own.
iTunes account hacked
My wife's account was hacked but the response from Apple has been less than helpful. As several have posted the charges mostly were in the range of $40.00 but some as high as $100.00 plus. The problem seems to stem directly from iTunes and not having a credit card stolen. We have removed all credit card information on our accounts, and contacted Apple and our bank but initially we had a difficult time getting to a site on iTunes that would address our problem. If this has been a recurring event then maybe Apple should improve the security at iTunes.
My wife's account was hacked but the response from Apple has been less than helpful. As several have posted the charges mostly were in the range of $40.00 but some as high as $100.00 plus. The problem seems to stem directly from iTunes and not having a credit card stolen. We have removed all credit card information on our accounts, and contacted Apple and our bank but initially we had a difficult time getting to a site on iTunes that would address our problem. If this has been a recurring event then maybe Apple should improve the security at iTunes.
my account was hijacked a couple months ago, and I run into the same lack of help from Apple/iTunes. I discovered, only after my bank account went 600 into the negative, that a second pc had been authorized on my account. While my bank was brilliant and got the investigation under way hastily and got my funds replaced within 10 days, iTunes was as useless as tits on a bull. In some email correspondence with them (just try to get someone on the phone, go ahead..), I asked for the ip address of the pc's authorized on my account, and they declined to give them to be because it "violates their privacy agreement".
iTunes account hacked to the tune of £542.36
I've just had this happen to me, how did I find out, I received 23 receipts for apps for an iPad which I don't own.
Only way to contact iTunes is via email and they didn't respond for 40hrs and tried to suggest that someone must have got hold of my card details, yeah right, and my iTunes login ID and password and email address so Id get the receipts, they told me all the obvious stuff like cancel your card and tell your bank (I didn't think of any of that!!!!), then finished their mail by saying there was nothing else they could do unless my bank requested a chargeback!!!!!
I also had only 2 machines authorised for my account but when checking I discovered 4 - why can't you disable all machines regardless of how many there are????
Why is there no fast contact process for iTunes to report things like this???
My backs fraud department did say that this sort of thing happens all the time with iTunes and that they are the least helpful company they deal with when getting stolen funds back!!!
Some of the apps that were purchased did worry me a bit (you'd understand why if you saw them) so I contacted the police anti-terrorism squad who have given me a case number and said that it will be something they will definitely be investigating with iTunes.
Maybe iTunes needs to start listening to all these problems and instead of directing its customers to security advice documents and policies they'll start reading and following them themselves!!!!
I've just had this happen to me, how did I find out, I received 23 receipts for apps for an iPad which I don't own.
Only way to contact iTunes is via email and they didn't respond for 40hrs and tried to suggest that someone must have got hold of my card details, yeah right, and my iTunes login ID and password and email address so Id get the receipts, they told me all the obvious stuff like cancel your card and tell your bank (I didn't think of any of that!!!!), then finished their mail by saying there was nothing else they could do unless my bank requested a chargeback!!!!!
I also had only 2 machines authorised for my account but when checking I discovered 4 - why can't you disable all machines regardless of how many there are????
Why is there no fast contact process for iTunes to report things like this???
My backs fraud department did say that this sort of thing happens all the time with iTunes and that they are the least helpful company they deal with when getting stolen funds back!!!
Some of the apps that were purchased did worry me a bit (you'd understand why if you saw them) so I contacted the police anti-terrorism squad who have given me a case number and said that it will be something they will definitely be investigating with iTunes.
Maybe iTunes needs to start listening to all these problems and instead of directing its customers to security advice documents and policies they'll start reading and following them themselves!!!!
J
johndoe39de
Guest
Same here: wanted to log into my account > password not correct > apple id not correct > 7 invalid charges on my credit card. Apple is really a pain when it comes to security 
Unbelievable they've not fixed that problem in 2 years.
I wonder how they got the account information in the first place? I have a secure password, never click any fishing mails, no malware on the computer and still the iTunes account was hacked. It's the first time anything was hacked from me and it's an Apple product. Congratulations
As soon as I have my account back I'll set the payment method to "None" and will never buy anything again from iTunes.
Unbelievable they've not fixed that problem in 2 years.I wonder how they got the account information in the first place? I have a secure password, never click any fishing mails, no malware on the computer and still the iTunes account was hacked. It's the first time anything was hacked from me and it's an Apple product. Congratulations
As soon as I have my account back I'll set the payment method to "None" and will never buy anything again from iTunes.
I know this post was 2 years ago, but seriously: no wonder people think you're just a shill around here.
Anywho, you guys can add me to the list. I logged on my email tonight and lo and behold... an invoice:
Guess what? $40.10 in charges... hmm. And the same pattern too... a $1.00 transaction first then suddenly a bunch of others with various music/things.
Looks like Apple might not be of much help so I guess it will be up to Visa/Bank of America
/sigh
Anywho, you guys can add me to the list. I logged on my email tonight and lo and behold... an invoice:
Guess what? $40.10 in charges... hmm. And the same pattern too... a $1.00 transaction first then suddenly a bunch of others with various music/things.
Looks like Apple might not be of much help so I guess it will be up to Visa/Bank of America
/sigh
Here it is, about 3 years after the first post about getting hacked, and we're still dealing with it.
I got an e-mail from a risk service that apparently contracts with my bank stating that there were suspicious charges on my account. I called them, and sure enough, there were 4 charges pending on my debit card. Since then, they've been denied, the card cancelled, and I've vowed to never use my debit or credit card again with itunes. It's too easy to use an actual itunes gift card, so that's what we'll be doing.
I contacted Apple's customer service, to see if I could get my $11 in credit back that was used for the first charge. So far, I haven't had success.
I've been told that it's not us getting hacked, it's iTunes getting hacked.
Thoughts?
I got an e-mail from a risk service that apparently contracts with my bank stating that there were suspicious charges on my account. I called them, and sure enough, there were 4 charges pending on my debit card. Since then, they've been denied, the card cancelled, and I've vowed to never use my debit or credit card again with itunes. It's too easy to use an actual itunes gift card, so that's what we'll be doing.
I contacted Apple's customer service, to see if I could get my $11 in credit back that was used for the first charge. So far, I haven't had success.
I've been told that it's not us getting hacked, it's iTunes getting hacked.
Thoughts?
Since posting this information last night, I found out that those "pending" charges DID go through, and because of those ($200 worth), my checking account was seriously overdrawn. Another $200 worth. Thankfully, I have a great credit union and they're working with me to get it all taken care of.
I have posted this info on my Facebook, and advising everyone to delete their CC or debit numbers from iTunes and only using gift cards.
ACK!
I know that $400 isn't much compared to others, but it's devastating when you're already struggling to make ends meet! (which means I won't be buying music anytime soon...)
I have posted this info on my Facebook, and advising everyone to delete their CC or debit numbers from iTunes and only using gift cards.
ACK!
I know that $400 isn't much compared to others, but it's devastating when you're already struggling to make ends meet! (which means I won't be buying music anytime soon...)
How are they hacking into our accounts in the first place - how are they getting our passwords? If only we could get an official percentage of how many itunes account holders have said they have had their accounts hacked - are we talking fractions of a percent or tens of percent?
Yeah
The weird thing was that I could still access my account, so they never changed the password. So I am thinking they hacked my account and did not change the PW because they know it notifies the user of account changes. Either way I cancelled the card and I am currently disputing all charges. Lesson learned: Use itunes gift cards, their security tends to suck. This is coming from someone who has used online stores for years and always kept my security close to the chest. So it's disheartening.
The weird thing was that I could still access my account, so they never changed the password. So I am thinking they hacked my account and did not change the PW because they know it notifies the user of account changes. Either way I cancelled the card and I am currently disputing all charges. Lesson learned: Use itunes gift cards, their security tends to suck. This is coming from someone who has used online stores for years and always kept my security close to the chest. So it's disheartening.
Yes - I could still access my account and only found out when I got an invoice email and realised they were purchases I hadnt made.
My bank blocked the last of 4 transactions as they flagged it as suspicious so my account now says I still owe apple for the last lot of hacked purchases which means I cant remove my card from the account (the 'none' option in payment details is not available when you apple claims you owe them money).
I changed my password but I didnt get any notification that I had done this?
My bank blocked the last of 4 transactions as they flagged it as suspicious so my account now says I still owe apple for the last lot of hacked purchases which means I cant remove my card from the account (the 'none' option in payment details is not available when you apple claims you owe them money).
I changed my password but I didnt get any notification that I had done this?
Yesterday my credit union contacted me saying there was suspicious activity on my debit card. Sure enough over 10 transactions in the $40-$50 area all on iTunes equaling to $558. This is definitely a problem, since then I've e-mailed MSNBC hoping they'll pick up the story and investigate this problem.
Maybe if you feel like this problem should be know to ALL users try e-mailing MSNBC.
Maybe if you feel like this problem should be know to ALL users try e-mailing MSNBC.
Another Complaint to add
I also received a receipt via email on my "Purchases" on 7/2/10. I made the mistake of storing my debit card on the itunes store app. I have run into the exact same responses that other users are reporting--only email as a method of contact.
That response was to tell me how to change passwords, etc. - stock answers and to also tell me of no refunds. I was an internet technician for years so the iTunes advise was second nature for me but with little hope for "fixing" the issue since I believe that the breach was on the iTunes server.
Thankfully, I carry a smartphone with my email setup on it, so I received the invoice quickly. Most of the 15 purchases where for items that I don't even own i.e. iphone (I have a blackberry) and ipod (I'm 47 and I still use a radio for my music). I was able to verify the $70.15 charge via mobile banking and immediately called my bank. The transaction was in the processing stage and I think my bank was able to refuse it--I'll see after the holiday weekend. With my card canceled, the additional $20+ charge was unable to be authorized.
I noticed reading the comments that someone was starting a class action suit, there are enough victims to be able to make iTunes responsible for this.
I will not take this laying down--I've filed a police report and filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau and if I can afford it--I want to be included in the class action suit if it was started. I am currently trying to figure out how to get the news media notified of this scam.
Good luck to everyone on getting justice for this crime.
beccid63@gmail.com
I also received a receipt via email on my "Purchases" on 7/2/10. I made the mistake of storing my debit card on the itunes store app. I have run into the exact same responses that other users are reporting--only email as a method of contact.
That response was to tell me how to change passwords, etc. - stock answers and to also tell me of no refunds. I was an internet technician for years so the iTunes advise was second nature for me but with little hope for "fixing" the issue since I believe that the breach was on the iTunes server.
Thankfully, I carry a smartphone with my email setup on it, so I received the invoice quickly. Most of the 15 purchases where for items that I don't even own i.e. iphone (I have a blackberry) and ipod (I'm 47 and I still use a radio for my music). I was able to verify the $70.15 charge via mobile banking and immediately called my bank. The transaction was in the processing stage and I think my bank was able to refuse it--I'll see after the holiday weekend. With my card canceled, the additional $20+ charge was unable to be authorized.
I noticed reading the comments that someone was starting a class action suit, there are enough victims to be able to make iTunes responsible for this.
I will not take this laying down--I've filed a police report and filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau and if I can afford it--I want to be included in the class action suit if it was started. I am currently trying to figure out how to get the news media notified of this scam.
Good luck to everyone on getting justice for this crime.
beccid63@gmail.com
itunes hacked
http://www.macstories.net/news/itunes-accounts-hacked-by-vietnamese-developer/
changing the payment options on your itunes store account to 'none' might be a good idea for a while.
http://www.macstories.net/news/itunes-accounts-hacked-by-vietnamese-developer/
changing the payment options on your itunes store account to 'none' might be a good idea for a while.
A lot of public articles have surfaced over this. http://mashable.com/2010/07/04/itunes-accounts-hacked/