« Previous Post | Blog Home | Next Post »
British TV Star Foolishly Publishes Bank Account Number to Prove a Point
Posted on Jan 7, 2008 by Tom Fragala
Unfortunately for this twit, he proved the opposite point of what he was trying to. Here is what happened.
Jeremy Clarkson, presenter of popular British TV show Top Gear, wanted to prove a point. There was recently a massive data breach of 25 million identities in Britain, including bank account numbers. It created an enormous furor. This fellow thought it was a tempest in a teapot and to "prove" the data breach fears were overblown he actually published his bank account number, routing number and instructions on how to find his mailing address. And he actually said the following in the article:
All you'll be able to do with them is put money into my account. Not take it out. Honestly, I've never known such a palaver about nothing"
Problem is that is totally false...and galactically stupid. Sure enough someone set up a fraudulent debit from his account of 500 British pounds--to a charity. He's lucky that's all they did.
He later had to admit the truth,
"I opened my bank statement this morning to find out that someone has set up a direct debit which automatically takes £500 from my account," he said. "I was wrong and I have been punished for my mistake."
Read more at the BBC.
Filed under: Identity Theft, Privacy
Comments
ed dickson on Jan 8, 2008
Reminds me of Todd ...What's his name that still publishes his SSN on all his ads despite having a kook use it to get a loan.
Great post.
Post a Comment