Damage Exceeds 10 Million Won Per Person
In Suncheon, South Jeolla Province, a series of incidents have occurred in which tens of millions of won were charged without authorization to credit cards for items that were never purchased, prompting the police to launch a full-scale investigation.
According to the Suncheon Police Station in South Jeolla Province on the 25th, a series of reports have recently been filed by local residents who said they received text messages for payment approvals on items they had not bought.
The police investigation has so far identified a total of seven victims, including married couples and sisters. The amount of unauthorized charges they reported reaches as much as 54 million won, and it is known that about 24 million won of this was fortunately canceled after strong protests by the victims.
The crimes were mainly committed in the early morning hours and were concentrated between January 31 and February 20. The charged items ranged widely from health supplements to high-priced electronic products such as massage chairs and refrigerators.
The methods were also bold. In one case, a victim received a series of approval messages in the early morning hours, and a total of 13 million won was charged in six separate transactions. In another case, when an attempt to charge 3 million won to a victim's card was declined due to exceeding the credit limit, the perpetrators immediately lowered the amount to 2 million won and successfully reattempted the payment, showing a high level of calculation.
Some victims reportedly asked the credit card companies to cancel the unauthorized charges, were refused, and then filed reports directly with the police.
The police are paying attention to the fact that the victims' credit cards are issued by four different companies. Accordingly, they consider it less likely that the card companies' own servers were breached and are instead focusing their investigation on the possibility that personal information was leaked and used in phishing crimes through existing merchant payment processes, online shopping, or mobile applications (apps).
A police official said, "Card numbers may have been exposed while purchasing goods in the past, or valuable personal information may have been leaked in the course of transactions conducted via the internet and mobile phone apps," adding, "Because payments can be made with just a leaked card number, people must be extremely careful not to let this information be exposed to others. We will keep all possibilities open and conduct a thorough investigation."
© The Asia Business Daily(www.asiae.co.kr). All rights reserved.
