Going Cashless – Scammers Delight

Over the last 12 months I have read so many reports in the MSM and computer media regarding how scammers are moving away from trying to hack into computers using viruses and malware, and have since moved on towards hacking into apps where you can pay using your phone.

The Weakest Link is the QR code (or Quick Response). This looks like a barcode but is a method where a phone installed with a QR reader can scan and interpret the QR code in order to make a payment for a service.

The link below is just one example where scammers can produce dodgy QR of their own, which they then place on top of legitimate QR codes (or remove the latter completely). The victim comes along scan the code and then finds his bank has been hacked and his money pinched.

These scams can happen anywhere where cashless payments by phone/card is your only option. The providers of these services warn customers to be “vigilant” about using QR codes, which to me seems like they’re shifting responsibility away from themselves and onto the punter to worry about.

Nearly everywhere you go these days retailers are demanding that you pay cashless by either contactless card and/or “download the app”. You’ll see it even more or train stations, carparks, airports and not just ordinary shops.  All of which means that you are being tracked not only by where you are and what you’ve bought, but also the sharing of your personal information stored on your phone. And its this that hackers are after, which means we have to be even more cautious how we use an app.

The “Go Cashless” project is just another complication in an already complicated life for a lot of people. And using these apps to pay for things is just another example.

 

Telegraph News Link

Nominated by: Technocunt

71 thoughts on “Going Cashless – Scammers Delight

    • What if it’s the only way to buy ANYTHING?

      That’s the plan.

      Followed by adding a use-by date to prevent saving

      A cashless society is an enslaved society.

      • CHIK,

        They already prevent cash saving by constantly changing the bank notes.

        It’s nothing to do with forgery prevention or they would have always done it as frequently.

  1. Why is it that we need a fucking app for everything. My credit card now needs me to open the app on my phone to approve any online purchase. Of course I understand the security issue, but does this mean I will have to keep updating my phone until I pop my clogs? To be honest, I am trying to wean myself off the fucking thing, not use it more.

    • Good nom Techno👍
      So how do you protect yourself from this?

      I sometimes buy online using PayPal.

      • Be careful, if you piss PayPal off they will freeze your funds and deduct 2500 quid, it’s in their t’s and C’s, seriously.

      • To be honest Termujin,
        I wouldn’t even know how to go about pissing them off?!

        Just occasionally buy using PayPal,
        Mainly on my debit card though.

        Thanks for the warning!
        Wasn’t aware of that! 👍

      • Hiya Meat Curtains 👍

        Yes, I’d heard of them shutting down accounts.
        Think it’s mainly through voicing opinions they don’t like?

        Sure if they read my views on here they’d see I’m a level headed moderate,
        With a fair and reasonable standpoint 🙂

      • Yes, me too.
        They ( PayPal) have been brilliant on two occasions when ordered goods haven’t arrived.
        Immediate refund, no problem.
        I use them for preference, but it’s linked to my credit card, so I can, and have, used charge back.

      • “…if you piss PayPal off they will freeze your funds and deduct 2500 quid, it’s in their t’s and C’s, seriously.”

        Plenty of horror stories about this disturbing corporate theft, I set up a completely seperate bldg. soc. account that serves no other purpose than to funnel my cash into Pisspal as reqd. Never more than 50p left in it at any one time.

    • I can see a backlash coming against “smart” phones this decade. I actually had a dream where there were mass bonfires with people chucking their phones into them! You really don’t need them, you can get by easily with a basic text-and-call phone. internet-phones are the biggest mass-distraction gizmo ever, people have been lulled into thinking they are 100% essential – and they aren’t. I use a basic phone and just wait until I am home to use the internet. Being bleeped by a message/alert/email all day is a massive pain in the arse.

      A lot of technology comes and goes and smart-phones might be one of them. Maybe something else will come along and replace them that is less obnoxious, that is way cooler. I could see that happening in the next decade.

      • Hear hear… 3G all the way for me.Does calls, does texts and it does mp3s, anything that can be disabled or removed is, only thing I ever download is Guitar Tuna.

        I miss my Ericson ‘Shark’phone mind, lasted ten years of site work, dropped the cunt off scaffolds twice, puddles too many times to recall and even dropped it down the bog once, rinsed the piss off and good to go. then my teething 2yr old got hold of it and basically chewed its keypad, trim and gasketing to fuck in minute’s inattention.

      • “…3G is getting turned off soon, mate.”

        Oh fer fuck’s sake!!!! erm… ‘ang on a minute… 3+2=5 so if I get an old 2G phone and cellotpe it to this one and turn them both on…? Cracked it

    • It’s not about security, it’s about tracking and control.

      This is seriously fucking dangerous

  2. As an older person I am finding technologies are moving faster than I can keep pace with.
    I rely heavily on my children to keep me safe this way.
    I pity anyone who is older and isolated from family and friends. No wonder we hear so much more about people having their savings stolen.
    If businesses want people to use this kind of technology, then they should either make it safe or guarantee that funds fraudulently obtained will be reimbursed.
    Until and unless, they can stick their QR codes up their arse. I won’t be using them.

    • How’s that 5 gallon jug full of coppers going JP? I bet the paperboy looks forward to his Christmas tip.

      I don’t know what a QR code is either. I have seen then about but just looks like some bored cunt has been doodling on something.

      • Added another 11p today,LL, just street money I find on dog walks.
        I’ll be worth burglaring, soon.
        Plenty of foreign looking types moving onto my estate recently.

      • It’s a bad day when I don’t pick up at least 5p.
        Well, if the cunt who dropped it doesn’t care, why not?

      • In notes.
        I run the jar through Coinstar.
        They take 5% and issue a coupon that’s valid that day off your shop.

  3. I am ok with having a QR code as a ticket, as long as my phone doesn’t die, it’s easy to buy online and get the e-ticket but what the fuck happens if your phone dies 😂

    I have used it a few times on LNER fuck getting an App and there is no way I am linking any bank/card account to my phone.

    As we are on a techno nom and all things internet has anyone else experienced a fake mail supposedly from Outlook/Hotmail.

    I had one which said someone accessed my hotmail address, I twigged it was a scam when, although it was a no reply, I selected the reply button just to see and it came up with some fucking shit email address.
    I did some digging and found that by logging onto my msn account I can actually check when and where I logged in as well as failed attempts. I was shocked at the number of attempted log ins from Russia to Mexico.

    There is a genuine hotmail warning email in case anyone else has hotmail….

    account-security-noreply@accountprotection.microsoft.com

    If it’s anything else it’s a scam.

  4. See the one in Newcastle where the twat have 41 fake twenty pound notes that had

    “Twenty Poonds” written on the top – I kid you not me fellow cunters” – this ain’t some And & Dec (who I want to slap so fucking hard) joke.

  5. Thanks for the advice / warning Techno. 👍

    These scamming Cunts are quicker than flies on shit to exploit so-called ‘progress’. Best to assume everyone is a scammer until proven otherwise.

  6. Cash is king. They can’t turn off my wallet remotely.
    It is annoying when companies insist on this.I’m not sure why a QR code is thought to be so good – it is just a link to a website isn’t it?

    • I agree with you but we are moving toward a totally cash free economy at frightening speed, with all the privacy problems that come with it.

      • Recall those times that you were in desperate situations and cold hard cash bought you out if it. Go on – RECALL THEM!

        Now imagine all you have is an dead-battery “smart” phone.

        Yeah.

      • Gordon, spot on.
        Buy summat with that, you twat!
        My girls bought me Faraday wallets, when cards went contact less, and get me new ones periodically, because they get worn, and therefore vulnerable.
        I never use my card at an outdoor ATM to withdraw cash, and don’t take it out of the wallet until I’m at the point of pushing it the machine, or tap’n’paying.
        Jeez, that’s a fucking phrase I hate, tap and pay. Fuck off, here’s a fiver, it’s a £2:30 coffee, not a Cruise missile.

      • JP,
        Always have a look round when using a ATM.

        Know your a pensioner,
        And mean nothing by this but unsavoury types like to target the elderly gent at cash points.

        Few years ago,
        My dad at a cashpoint,
        Two youngster run up behind him,
        Stood waiting.
        Miserable snr growled –

        “fuck off or I’ll snap your jaw”

        Youngsters meekly

        “Hello uncle Malc..”

        Heeehee 😄

        I nearly died laughing.

      • That’s why I always get the ( lovely heated) bus to the ( lovely heated) shopping place.
        Soup and a sandwich pensioners special, then I get a security to escort me to an ATM, and then back on the ( lovely heated) bus and home.
        I use the free Wi-Fi on the bus to click Hive on, turn the heating back on. The cat and dog have been fine.
        They have fur coats.

    • A QR code can contain a lot of information, not just a website link

      I’m not religious but having a QR code forced upon you is somewhat similar to ‘The Mark of the Beasr’

    • Last Friday my mum and dad ordered a Chinese takeaway.

      The bloke delivering it was Asian,
      He left his car running with the keys in!!

      As he handed my dad the meal his car drove off!
      😁

      Bet his bosses and the coppers first question was how did he get in your car?

      • Actually, Minarets, that’s priceless!
        I’m trying to imagine the blokes face.
        Asian blokes aren’t the most expressive, are they.
        Sad, happy, rage, that’s about it, really.
        I’d have been pissing myself, laughing.
        I’d have had to go in the kitchen to laugh.

  7. The thought of a cashless society is a tad chilling. However, it woukd stamp out cash-in-hand businesses who pay naught in tax: Kurdish barbers, Polish cafés, any Asian restaurant, rinky-dink takeaways, Turkish cunts selling kebabs/fried dog, Nigerians, Vietnamese nail technicians/whores, and dodgy Romanian builders casing housing for future burglary.

    • You missed out car washes.
      We had one, set up in the car park of an empty pub, all “legit”. They were leasing off the owner.
      Then the police raided the pub. Massive, and I mean massive cannabis factory.
      Needless to say, the people operating the car wash were all swarthy looking types, none of whom spoke a word of English.

      • I cunted Hand Car Washes a few years back, Jee-P. 100% of them are drugs businesses. You know it, I know it, everybody knows it….. except the Rozzers. They must be making a big slab from the backhanders.

  8. This nom is by Technocunt? I would have never guessed.
    There will always be economies that don’t use the established systems.
    The barter system for example:
    “I’ll trade you 20 rounds of 9mm self defense for a 12 pack of ass wipe and 10 minutes with your wife.”
    No app needed.

  9. Don’t know what I’d do without Technocunt’s regular warnings about digital life.
    Do you know how to hack my blood pressure monitor to reduce the readings by 20%?

      • Oh, come on Jaguar,
        So few delights left, when you get to a certain age.
        Besides, I drink like Bestie, and my blood pressure is well OK, I know this, I have a monitor.

    • Get the calibration checked, if you’re using a home monitor.
      Claim white coat syndrome at the GP/hospital.
      What I do.
      Although recently, mines been spot on, so the drugs are working.

  10. Did nobody learn anything from the whole track and trace bullshit?

    You can’t enter a pub or restaurant without checking in with the government first. Ring any bells?

    What did you think they were softening you up for?

    It’s just been exploited by criminals because you have no idea what that QR code is, what it does or where every byte of information on your phone is being sent.

    Turn off your QR scanner, remove all access to your data from the apps on your phone and be very wary.

    None of this is for your benefit.

  11. Can’t imagine my local car breakers ever going ‘cashless.’ If you literally had the bare faced cheek, to pull out an American Express Card down there, you would probably have left with the part stuck well up your rectum.

    • I only accept cash.
      Don’t like it?
      Fuck off.
      Get someone else.

      Cash is king👑
      Your in control.

      That’s why they want rid.

  12. And what would the Pikeys do in a cashless society? Never gonna happen.
    However, there’s a lot of things I thought were never gonna happen and they fucking have. As always, look after number one, no other cunt is looking out for you.

    • Freddie, no more driving the elderly and confused to cashpoints, to withdraw funds, they’ll get his mobile number, send him a QR code and help him to skin hisself like a rabbit.

      • That isn’t far off the mark JP. Homeless people and Big Issue sellers in Sweden have been excepting debit card payments on smartphones since about 2013. The fucking Scandi progressives. This being Sweden I bet an issue costs about a tenner too.

  13. I’m prolly a bit more aware of scammers, trying to scam me, than most.
    One of my jobs was scam detection, but even so.
    Things have moved on, tech is different now.
    All I can say, is if you hear hooves, don’t automatically think horses.

  14. fucking hate all the new security measures as far as banking is concerned and online bollox shopping
    oh fuck “where’s me jumper” with all the codes and recognition
    Cash is no longer King they’d have you believe, but until it is banned, i will still love it

    • Cause i don’t need Claus following me around, scrutinising what i eat, drink and see.
      “Im a free man, ye cunt Claus an don’t need you to be happy”

  15. We were all a lot happier when we just had Sinclair Spectrums in our homes, or if you wanted to be really high tech The Amstrad PcW 8256, with 3″ disks AND a modem if you really needed one. “Oh call back yesterday, bid time return!” as Shakespeare had it (in Richard) ll.

    I am after the Radio 3 repeats again.

  16. Banks recently made payments *less secure* by raising the contactless limit in shops to £100.

    ‘It’s all for your security’. Bunkum.

    Worth watching the video ‘The Big Reset’.

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