Consumer complaint received 2024-01-09
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service — Mobile or digital wallet
Issue: Unauthorized transactions or other transaction problem — 
Company: DISCOVER BANK (TN)

On XX/XX/, I fell victim to a scam. At XXXX XXXX, I received a text message from the number ( XXXX ) XXXX stating the following : DISCOVER ALERT : Did You Attempt A {$270.00} Purchase At XXXX? Reply YES/NO/HELP. I did not reply to this text. At the same time ( XXXX XXXX  ), I received a call from a spoofed Discover Bank Support number, XXXX ( XXXX ) XXXX. This call lasted 43 minutes. The person calling stated that he wanted to alert me to a fraudulent purchase at XXXX and XXXX XXXX. The charges were for the amounts {$450.00} and {$420.00} from XXXX and XXXX XXXX respectively ; these were real charges on my CASHBACK DEBIT account ( now closed ). Under the pretenses of verifying my identity, I was asked to provide my full name, address, date of birth, mothers maiden name, and Social Security Number, all of which I provided to the scammer, because I thought they were calling from Discover Bank Support and had no reason to believe otherwise. Again, under the pretenses of verifying my identity, the scammer asked me to confirm the identification code being sent to me from a Discover Bank number ( XXXX ). This was presumably to gain access to my Discover Bank account. Again, I still had no reason to believe that I was being scammed since I recognized the number sending the identification codes as I had previous messages from the number. The message read as follows : Discover Bank : Please enter code XXXX  as your temporary identification code when prompted. If you did not request this code, please contact us. Send STOP to quit. Over the course of the next 40 minutes, 5 more identification codes were sent to me by the same number, all of which the scammer wanted me to provide. Additionally, the scammer was asking me if I recognized certain XXXX transfers and charges on my checking account. These transfers and charges were all legitimate charges. The scammer also wanted me to sign-out and delete my Discover Banking app and remove my card from my XXXX XXXX. They stated this was to combat and isolate the fraudulent activity. During this time, a fraudulent transfer of {$1600.00} was made from my Savings account to Checking account. Then, a XXXX Payment of {$1200.00} was attempted by a XXXX ( transaction code : XXXX ), but it was rejected. Another XXXX Payment of {$1200.00} was attempted by a XXXX  ( transaction code : XXXX ) and this one posted. As this was happening, the scammer was presumably stalling by going over recent charges and XXXX Payments from my account, all which were legitimate, and I recognized. 

After the suspicious number of identification codes and questions about recent account activity, I hung up the phone and called Discover Support directly at XXXX XXXX  to file a report of fraudulent activity. Both my Checking and Savings account numbers were reissued, and an investigation was opened for each instance of fraud : 1 ) fraudulent transfer between accounts, 2 ) fraudulent XXXX Payments, and 3 ) fraudulent debit charges. The investigation into the fraudulent debit charges from XXXX and XXXX XXXX concluded the charges were not authorized, and I was reimbursed the full amount. However, the investigation into the fraudulent XXXX Payments concluded that the XXXX Payments were not unauthorized, and I would not be reimbursed. I find it absurd that the debit charges were found to fraudulent and correctly reversed, yet the XXXX transfer was not. In letters from Discover they stated the following reasons for the XXXX transfer being found to be non-fraudulent : No indication of account take over, no indication of unusual online account activity, transactions do not indicate fraudulent activity, and inconsistent information provided by account holder throughout the investigation. First, it seems paradoxical to me the two debit charges were found to be fraudulent, yet Discover insists there was no unusual account activity and no indication of fraudulent activity. Second, they claim there was inconsistent information provided, yet they only asked me a few questions regarding the fraudulent activity when I called to report it. How can one say I provided inconsistent info when Discover did not take the proper time to learn about the fraudulent activity and only asked me a couple questions? 

After the investigation, I requested a copy of the login activity on my account the day of the fraudulent activity, and I requested a copy of all documents used in the fraud investigation on two separate occasions. I never received any of these documents. I was advised by Discover to open a re-dispute since I was not satisfied with the original investigation 's conclusion. They instructed me to upload any relevant documentation to a secure document upload center to open a re-dispute. I filed an Identity Theft Report to the FTC, a police report about the fraudulent XXXX transfer and identity theft, and an FBI IC3 cyber-crimes report. I uploaded the confirmation of the FTC Identity Theft Report I filed, the XXXX  Police Report, and the FBI IC3 Report. I also uploaded images showing the fraudulent activity, the time and duration of the scammers call, the identification codes, and text message from ( XXXX ) XXXX. I called the Discover Fraud team on XX/XX/XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX to check on the status of the re-dispute, and both times I was assured that the documents were being looked at and a re-dispute investigation was in-progress. However, I recently called again to check on XX/XX/XXXX and was told that a re-dispute was never officially opened even though I was assured twice that one was. I am concerned that the investigation ( s ) into the fraudulent XXXX payment of {$1200.00} is not being handled with proper due diligence. I was told that I gave inconsistent information throughout the investigation, yet it is clear that Discover Bank is giving me inconsistent information. I am considering taking this issue to my attorney general.