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Britney Vinyl Fraud?! - BE CAREFUL


RyeGuy

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Let me start this off by saying that I work in online customer service where I deal with people's payments and credit cards. I know many of you will be ordering the vinyl, so this is just a warning because I'm hella worried for y'all.

I'm like 99% sure someone is attempting to spam me through the Britney Spears store. I purchased the vinyl through the official website (YASSS), received confirmation from the "orders@britneyspears.com" email, etc.

All seems fine.

THEN I receive a random email from "CustomerService-Associate1@araca.com" (sketchy as **** email address btw) which states the following: 

Thank you for your recent order. Unfortunately there is an issue and your order has been flagged. The payment information you supplied with your order seems to have an error. We will need to get in contact with you before the order can be processed. In addition, we are unable to reserve stock for your order. A prompt response will increase the likelihood of fulfillment of your order. If we do not hear back from you within 48 hours, we will have to cancel your order. 

Regards,

OK so FINE, I get a little worried cuz I want dat vinyl, so I ask what they need from me to make sure it goes through. I check my credit card, it's fine, etc. They don't answer for like 2 days so I ask them again to confirm if it went through or not. Then I get this: 

The issue lies in the fact that there are people who are trying to commit credit card fraud on our website. We are trying to do our best to protect our customers like yourself, as well as protecting the company. In an effort to protect all parties involved, we have tightened our security protocols for all of our orders.

Another aspect is that some foreign banks (outside of the United States), do not adhere to the same security protocols that we have in here in the United States. Some of these international transaction, consequently getting flagged. We usually can overcome this situation with the customer verifying certain information. 

Should you be willing to provide the necessary information, we should be able to remedy this situation. All we need from you is to verify the name on the card, complete billing address, the last four digits of the credit card used for the transaction (last four digits ONLY), the expiration and CV# on the back. 

If you are comfortable moving forward, please provide the above information. Should you not be willing to share the above information needed to move forward, we will unfortunately have to cancel your order. We apologize for the inconvenience. 

If you have any further questions please do not hesitate to ask!

So just to inform y'all (even though it's common sense), all of this info should never be sent out over the internet. Companies can ask you for a FEW of these things like "the last 4 digits + expiration" etc, but not ALL of them at once. They also should never be asking for the code on the back. It's pretty smart of them to spin it off as being like they are the ones trying to avoid fraud.

What worries me is that this email came linked to the original confirmation email which is like 99% legitimate. I almost feel like someone who works on the inside is attempting to steal card info by gaining access to their emails. 

 

PLEASE don't fall for this, at least without asking a ton of questions first. 

 

BE CAREFUL GIRLS!!!!!!

(I emailed the orginal "orders" team about this, will post updates if I get any)

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Just now, YouFeelLikeParadise said:

They seem legit to me, they might be the people in charge

Contact them and ask them for clarification

http://www.araca.com/contact 

Like, I have no doubt that ARACA is handling the merch, it's just that literally anyone can have the email address I received that from. I also feel like maybe one of their employees is forwarding the confirmations to himself then reaching out externally to try and scam people

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1 minute ago, RyeGuy said:

Like, I have no doubt that ARACA is handling the merch, it's just that literally anyone can have the email address I received that from. I also feel like maybe one of their employees is forwarding the confirmations to himself then reaching out externally to try and scam people

I'm not saying you are wrong but I think they are following the correct protocol. I've had this happened to me before (not on the Britney store) but Forever 21 and American Eagle and they pretty much asked for the same info, my CV, last 4 digits and address. They do this for precaution. 

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5 minutes ago, YouFeelLikeParadise said:

In what country do you live? My friend from Argentina had this problem.

I live in the US and the order came through fine.

I live in Canada... like I've NEVER had a billing issue like they are detailing 

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Just now, RafaelSoares said:

They never mentioned Britney's vinyl tho, so I guess it was a coincidence that you received this after you purchased the overpriced thing from Britney's website. They probably sent it to millions of emails, just to scam anyone who happened to have made a purchase recently.

Soooo, that's actually a good point! The only thing I found strange is that when I received the email, it automatically tied it into the other email that I had received to confirm the order. Almost as if I was CC'd or they were forwarded the confirmation, then they reached out to me.

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17 minutes ago, RyeGuy said:

I live in Canada... like I've NEVER had a billing issue like they are detailing 

From Canada too and haven't had any issues like that...yet. Although, if they're asking for only the last four digits, isn't that kinda safer?

i mean, they could already have your entire credit card number too, but a good green flag is that they aren't asking for the full thing.

all in all, it really does sound shady tho. 

5 minutes ago, RafaelSoares said:

They never mentioned Britney's vinyl tho, so I guess it was a coincidence that you received this after you purchased the overpriced thing from Britney's website. They probably sent it to millions of emails, just to scam anyone who happened to have made a purchase recently.

Also this. 

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