The Gorham Youth Soccer Association was recently alerted about a security breach affecting the data maintained by Challenger Gear. Parents were alerted of the breach from both GYSA and Challenger Gear. They were asked to monitor not only their account they used to purchase gear, but all of their accounts in case there was fraudulent activity found.
As it turned out, many parents shared they had, in fact, been hacked. Parents posted on the GYSA Facebook page amounts varying from $250 to a startling $4,360 charged to their debit/credit cards. It seems more people were compromised than were not.
Kristin Mollison said that when GYSA ordered new uniforms, parents were told the website required a credit card to process the order even though there would be no charges to their card. The uniform order was placed on July 14 and on September 3, Challenger sent an email saying that cards had been compromised. That same day it was apparent that there were fraudulent charges on her card. Mollison said, “My card was charged for just under $900: two orders at Nike.com for over $400 each and another charge at a gas station in Kalamazoo, MI.” TD Bank caught the fraud after another attempt to charge her card at a restaurant, also in Kalamazoo, MI, and shut her card off. She disputed the charges and expects that her account will be credited. Mollison also said she contacted Nike regarding the fraud in hopes they were able to stop the shipment on the orders placed.
Another parent, Amy Pelletier, shared that she too, was a victim of the breach. She entered her debit card information in for the uniforms and a backpack. She said, “I was alerted to fraudulent charges early the morning of August 30. There had been up to five charges (totaling approximately $1400) attempted on my debit card from a PayPams account in Michigan and then four attempted charges from an airline in Saudi Arabia.”
After Gorham Savings Bank alerted her of the charges, Pelletier called immediately and they shut the card off. She said, “I had no idea at that point how my card had been tampered with, “ as the email from Challenger had not yet gone out to the parents informing them that their cards may have been compromised.
“Luckily for us, the bank caught it in time and we lost no money from our account. I don’t think others were as lucky. Gorham Savings Bank took care of it very quickly thankfully!” Pelletier said she learned a valuable lesson from the breach – you should not use a debit card for online purchases, only a credit card.
If you feel your debit or credit card is involved in this breach or one similar, there are three important things to do according to Experian, a global leader in consumer and business credit reporting. First, call the issuer of the card and cancel it. If it is a debit card, it is recommended to change your pin number. Sometimes banks and issuers will automatically shut down the card if it has been involved in a breach. The second thing to do is monitor your accounts for suspicious activity. You will need to dispute any charges to your account immediately. Lastly, it is important to change any passwords associated with the accounts. If you use variations of the password for other accounts, change those as well.