A Thief With Culture. And a Conscience.

My phone rang Friday morning. The caller was labeled as "Private." So I ignored it. Some time later I attempted to purchase some movies on-line. My credit card was rejected.

Later, when I checked my voice mail I discovered the Private call was from my credit card company. Someone had stolen my credit card number and was making purchases. In Italy. The purchases were Friday morning and my company, Capital One, blocked the charges and shut down the card immediately after I didn't answer their fraud check call. This is the second time I've had my credit card number stolen and both times Capital One caught it right away and blocked further purchases. I bitch on occassion about the mass amounts of solicitations I get from them but they protect me vigorously. On a third occasion, while I was traveling in Texas, they called to verify some purchases. I had made them and all was well.

This time around the fraudulant purchases were unexpected. They were not for TVs or cash advances, or stereos. No, the thief attempted to buy tickets to an Italian ballet and made a "purchase" from the American Red Cross. I assume the latter was actually a donation. This is totally strange to me. For a very brief second I thought about letting the Red Cross purchase go. Of course, I couldn't! I had to block the fraud for my own protection and I hope the credit card is able to find the theives and punish them appropriately.

But how strange.