Seems there's a new spammer plot afoot.
A month or so ago, I made a purchase at a local Farmers' Market where the merchant had a little portable credit card reader. No problem with that as such -- I figured it was the same as giving the card to any other retail merchant.
The only somewhat peculiar aspect of the transaction was that the guy had no way to print out a receipt. He said I could give him my email address and I would get a receipt that way. I didn't really give it any thought and gave him an email address. And when I got home, his receipt was here waiting for me.
Then this past week I stopped by a small café for a sandwich and paid with a credit card. The clerk said, "I can just send your receipt to your email address."
Wait.......!?! How did she have my email address? I had never used my card there and I told her so.
She showed me on the screen there were two options, to print a receipt or to email it at #######-@-%%%%%%%.com. I couldn't for the life of me figure out how she had it and it really creeped me out.
I told her NOT to email my receipt; I preferred a printed copy. She could sense that I was perturbed about it and said, "I can delete your email address from our system if you like. "Yes, please do," I told her, still really bothered by the fact that she had it in the first place.
Then later I got to thinking and remembered the transaction at the Farmers' Market. And I also realized that lately I had started getting some spam when I hardly, hardly ever get any.*
After doing a little detective work, I discovered that the recent spam was coming to the same email address I had provided to the Farmers' Market merchant.
Either the Farmers' Market guy and the café use the same credit card processing service, or spam harvesters are selling people's email addresses to spammers and other credit card processors when they opt for a receipt via email.
I have already deleted that email account, and will never again provide my email address for the purpose of getting a credit card receipt.
You know, this sort of B.S. really chaps my hide.
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*I am very cautious about giving out my email address(es) because I have had some HUGE spam problems in the past. I never give it out to stores for their club cards, never put it on mailing lists that solicit my information, and never sign up for any sort of email-based coupon offers or anything like that at all.
Since I have my own domain name, I can set up multiple email accounts that all forward to a master account. I only use certain email addresses for certain things, never giving out the master address, so if I start getting spam I can usually figure out where it's coming from by the address it's coming to.
A month or so ago, I made a purchase at a local Farmers' Market where the merchant had a little portable credit card reader. No problem with that as such -- I figured it was the same as giving the card to any other retail merchant.
The only somewhat peculiar aspect of the transaction was that the guy had no way to print out a receipt. He said I could give him my email address and I would get a receipt that way. I didn't really give it any thought and gave him an email address. And when I got home, his receipt was here waiting for me.
Then this past week I stopped by a small café for a sandwich and paid with a credit card. The clerk said, "I can just send your receipt to your email address."
Wait.......!?! How did she have my email address? I had never used my card there and I told her so.
She showed me on the screen there were two options, to print a receipt or to email it at #######-@-%%%%%%%.com. I couldn't for the life of me figure out how she had it and it really creeped me out.
I told her NOT to email my receipt; I preferred a printed copy. She could sense that I was perturbed about it and said, "I can delete your email address from our system if you like. "Yes, please do," I told her, still really bothered by the fact that she had it in the first place.
Then later I got to thinking and remembered the transaction at the Farmers' Market. And I also realized that lately I had started getting some spam when I hardly, hardly ever get any.*
After doing a little detective work, I discovered that the recent spam was coming to the same email address I had provided to the Farmers' Market merchant.
Either the Farmers' Market guy and the café use the same credit card processing service, or spam harvesters are selling people's email addresses to spammers and other credit card processors when they opt for a receipt via email.
I have already deleted that email account, and will never again provide my email address for the purpose of getting a credit card receipt.
You know, this sort of B.S. really chaps my hide.
---
*I am very cautious about giving out my email address(es) because I have had some HUGE spam problems in the past. I never give it out to stores for their club cards, never put it on mailing lists that solicit my information, and never sign up for any sort of email-based coupon offers or anything like that at all.
Since I have my own domain name, I can set up multiple email accounts that all forward to a master account. I only use certain email addresses for certain things, never giving out the master address, so if I start getting spam I can usually figure out where it's coming from by the address it's coming to.
