Victim discovers his back account has been targeted by fraudsters

The victim, who does not wish to be identified, lives in Bradford, but noticed that he had bought goods in faraway Southampton - despite him not having being there.

He said: “I noticed on my bank statements that there were a number of items that I had not purchased.

“I think there were three or four items, one was in Southampton and there were others in different parts of the country.

“They all tended to be for small amounts, less than £100 each time.”

He says it appeared his details were used to buy items such as petrol and supermarket shopping.

His money was reimbursed by the bank but he does not know how the fraudsters got his details. He had security on his computer but he believes they may have got his card details after he bought goods from an internet site which he did not realise was being operated by rogues.

“I was annoyed when it happened but I suppose that I was lucky that I did not have any problems with the bank.

“You just have to be careful buying stuff and try to make sure its a reputable site,” he said.

He believes that the fraudsters only used his bank account to pay for smaller amounts because people don’t tend to notice small amounts have gone missing quite as quickly as they would larger amounts.

This gives the fraudsters more chance to cover their tracks and quickly disappear.

He says he still shops online but now uses a scheme from his bank which ensures he enters a password directly before the payment goes through. Since he has used this system he has not had any problems.

Experts say when people go to the website’s checkout to make a purchase they should make sure that a padlock symbol is displayed in either the website’s bottom right-hand corner of the webpage or in the address bar. The website address should also begin with https.

People should also protect their computers by ensuring security software and firewalls up-to-date.