From our front-page news:
Credit card theft is not entirely uncommon, but it might be surprising when thinking about all of the places that your personal numbers are scattered about. There's an on-going thread at Evil Avatar, where one member had his house broken into and had numerous items stolen (including his truck). Although of far less importance, it didn't take him too long to realize his credit card was being used for purchase of online goods, thanks to his Xbox 360's storing of his credit card information.
I am not sure how the entire process played out, but it seems like the Xbox 360 stores the credit card information without much security. His console was then used to purchase MS points - but if that was the case, wouldn't it be easier to track down who purchased them? I can't see too many thieves stealing a console just to purchase points for the original owner, although it could happen (out of spite, perhaps).
In the end, this story kind of woke me up to the reality that this kind of thing can happen to anyone, at any time. The fact that our credit card numbers are stored literally all over the place doesn't help things. The thread goes into the issue further, though, as it seems Microsoft isn't too helpful when it comes to having the credit card information removed. There are a billion different reasons to make sure your private information is kept safe, but this is a good one to add to the pile.
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At this point a few things ran through my mind. First, was credit card fraud, which was bad. The other was that someone had my Xbox and was playing games I had never owned and downloading and buying content, including every single piece of downloadable content for NHL 08. Oh Canada.
Source: Evil Avatar
I am not sure how the entire process played out, but it seems like the Xbox 360 stores the credit card information without much security. His console was then used to purchase MS points - but if that was the case, wouldn't it be easier to track down who purchased them? I can't see too many thieves stealing a console just to purchase points for the original owner, although it could happen (out of spite, perhaps).
In the end, this story kind of woke me up to the reality that this kind of thing can happen to anyone, at any time. The fact that our credit card numbers are stored literally all over the place doesn't help things. The thread goes into the issue further, though, as it seems Microsoft isn't too helpful when it comes to having the credit card information removed. There are a billion different reasons to make sure your private information is kept safe, but this is a good one to add to the pile.
<table align="center"><tbody><tr><td>
</td></tr></tbody></table>
At this point a few things ran through my mind. First, was credit card fraud, which was bad. The other was that someone had my Xbox and was playing games I had never owned and downloading and buying content, including every single piece of downloadable content for NHL 08. Oh Canada.
Source: Evil Avatar