The Luck Stops Here

I just got a lovely voice mail from my credit card company (gotta love vonage and those emailed VMs). Apparently my account was locked for “suspicious activity.”  After they sent me a new card before I left. A card which was allegedly supposed to prevent this sort of thing. How it was supposed to do this, I don’t know. The new card had the same number. A number that has now been relegated to the circular file as it was used in an attempt to purchase english lessons and a credit report.

Something about the combination of the two of those kindof scares the crap out of me.

I’m picturing a Nigerian scammer learning to speak english better so that his scammity scam scammy emails don’t come across as so laughably fake. And then digging through my credit to see how much he can take me for.

Hey, just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean that they’re not all out to get me.

I’m trying to do the right thing and change all of my online banking passwords… except Capital One insists that my new password be number, letters and dashes only. Oh, and it’s not case sensitive. Why don’t I just change my password to “kitty” and let the scammers run up some more charges? This must be new, because my current password is a 133t cornucopia of special characters. I’m torn between my desire to use proper password complexity and my desire to not use a password that has been potentially compromised.

I think that I’ll leave the password the same and let Capital One eat any bogus charges.

So, to summarize, we have:

• A brand new card (recieved the day before I left) that was supposed to prevent fraud and was compromised within 48 hours of activation
• Online banking that enforces passwords that would be laughably simple to crack
• Me, in Europe, with one less credit card to use (one down, one to go…)

Did I mention that Capital One recently raised my APR to almost 30%? Yeah, I don’t think that I’ll use them anymore.

Beyond changing passwords and monitoring my statements very closely, what else should I be doing? Putting a fraud alert on my SSN? How does one go about setting up a fraud alert anyways? Would I be better off hiring a large man with lots of chest hair and gold chains? How does one go about hiring a large man with chest hair and gold chains?

And, for pete’s sake, is my luck going to get any better? At this rate, this trip is going to end up with me in traction and I’m really hoping that it doesn’t reach that point.