Got my card done last week, credit card company didnt pay as it didnt look right. New cards within 2 days. Is it possible for someone to get my card details from my paypal account after Ive paid them as all my other transactions are usual ones

Unlikely.

More likely to have been cloned at a pub or petrol station, or somewhere using casual labour.

pub or petrol station most likely, good to use credit cards here rather than debit card to your current account. I learned that lesson when I was cleaned out to the tune of 4K (it was payday and I had a big overdraft facility) and the only two candidates were a pub and petrol station mortgage bounced and all sorts of things…

The Wireless card readers which many places use are the most common culprit, someone sits within range of the signal with a laptop, a receiver and a decoder and uplifts the electronic signature of your card and pin-number, the business owner wont know a thing about it; the days of ‘casual-labour’ cloning your card are much less common now as we all keep an eye on our cards and don’t let staff wander off to swipe them. Bad luck dj, I had a similar event but fortunately it was on a much lesser scale that yours.

When it happened to my wife, the bank said “Don’t even try to figure out how it happened. There are so many ways that they could have got the card details that you’ll go crazy and go to live in the woods rather than use your card again”

Mine got done with a card that had never been used

The Wireless card readers which many places use are the most common culprit, someone sits within range of the signal with a laptop, a receiver and a decoder and uplifts the electronic signature of your card and pin-number, the business owner wont know a thing about it; the days of ‘casual-labour’ cloning your card are much less common now as we all keep an eye on our cards and don’t let staff wander off to swipe them. Bad luck dj, I had a similar event but fortunately it was on a much lesser scale that yours.

Can you point to any evidence, that this type of attack is possible or indeed happening outside a research lab ?

I had 5K lifted via electronic online transfer from my credit card this month, all sorted though and not uncommon apparently.

Bazzer

My card just got cancelled yesterday by Barclaycard.

They received information from the fuzz who had recovered a list of card numbers somewhere, so instantly blocked my card.

New cards within 5 working days, bit of an inconvenience at this time of year but much less of an inconvenience than trying to sort out the alternative.

I never let my card out of my site and always look for anything suspicious when using the various swipe machines and card readers. Who knows how it happened but at least the CC companies are doing a good job of protecting us.

Sorry Bazzer, last year I was working in the Information Protection Risk dept of a major bank but I’ve since moved on so no longer have access to the facts/figures. You could try the websites of CapitalOne or MBNA as they have fairly open policies on fraud…for the conspiracy theorists out there its an interesting exercise to ask your bank about fraud rates and methodologies; in my personal experience there is widespread corporate reluctance to admit that banks are 2nd best in the Techno war between the fraudsters and the good guys, in essence it’s cheaper for the companies to recompense those clients who notice the fraud than it is to escalate the war to defeat fraud…but thats a whole other story!