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Skype Billing Gone Haywire For Some Users
Posted by
timothy
on Tue May 19, 2009 09:35 AM
from the looks-fine-from-here dept.
from the looks-fine-from-here dept.
Cousin Scuzzy writes "This morning I awoke to 26 e-mail messages from Skype and PayPal notifying me of multiple payments for my Skype account that had been charged to my credit card and subsequently refunded. At first I suspected that this was a new wave of spam that had slipped through my defenses, but it quickly became apparent that they were legitimate messages. I then began to worry that my Skype account had been compromised. The first message from Skype thanked me for setting up their "Auto-Recharge" service which automatically purchases Skype credit when the balance falls below a certain amount. This was very suspicious, as I had never requested this service. Based on posts to Skype's forum, it now appears that there have been serious billing problems at Skype relating to Auto-Recharge for over a month. Although I believe that all unauthorized charges to my credit card have been refunded, it is worrisome that Skype, or anyone, would charge my account erroneously. Skype, for their part, has not yet e-mailed me an explanation or posted one online. This problem reinforces my aversion to automatic bill payment services that give companies the authority to draw money from my bank account at their discretion." For all the Skype users out there, have you experienced this? For what it's worth, the company's own response on the linked forum thread says that the problem is now solved.
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No (Score:3, Informative)
For all the Skype users out there, have you experienced this?
Nope!
Skype isn't known for being forthcoming... (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm sure they will explain this situation right around the time they make a 64bit release for Linux... or release a version for Linux and Mac OS X that isn't horribly outdated in comparison to the Windows version.
I hate Skype in many ways, but the plain fact is that Ekiga on Windows is worse than Skype on Linux, and I never managed to get one successful call to my girlfriend or family via Ekiga.
If anyone knows of a cross-platform VOIP/webcam program that is better than Skype, I'd love to hear about it.
/. Genius Bar (Score:3, Interesting)
This should look *remarkably* familiar to some of you. http://www.counterpath.net/x-lite.html&active=4 [counterpath.net]
It's clear by the number of comments looking for a 'good' voip client you may not have a handle upstream issues. The only way to actually get a handle on it is to debug the UDP traffic.
1. NATing Most home networking devices have poor support for media NATing. (RTP/UDP The ones that have decent support are cursed with firmware supporting a single VOIP provider. This is where a device you can install
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Is this really difficult?
For some, yes it is.
the stateful tracking makes it work automatically
That's great that it works for you, but Nokia's 25 page troubleshooting guide suggests there are many problem users.
http://www.forum.nokia.com/info/sw.nokia.com/id/2e470bc4-236d-48e2-bc96-977784811af8/Nokia_S60_VoIP_Implementation_Troubleshooting_Guide.html [nokia.com]
Very nice guide for generalized VOIP problems!
It begin (Score:2, Funny)
It begins the Rise of the Machines skynet has declared war on humanity...
Oh Skype? never mind then
going on for months/years (Score:4, Interesting)
This happened to a friend of mine about a month ago. He got logged out of skype and couldn't get back in. Then he starts getting emails from Paypal about charges from his skype account for phone calls to somewhere in eastern Europe.
He got his account and money back but his contacts had all been wiped.
There is either a hole in skype or a piece of malware out there harvesting skype credentials. Google "lost skype account" or something like that.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I had this happen to me as well about a year ago. It looks like somebody is running a big scam in Eastern Europe. The strange thing is that I don't have a skype account, nor did I think I had a paypal account. In the end, I found out that at one point I bought an ELER [geekz.co.uk] t-shirt where the guy required that I create a paypal account and then I forgot I had created that. It took a f
Re:going on for months/years (Score:4, Interesting)
Looking into this further, it does appear that my Skype account was compromised last night. There were 428 international calls made with SkypeOut in a 13 minute period. And yes, Skype has my PayPal information, which in turn is linked to my credit card.
In retrospect I was responsible for leaving a trail of financial data that allowed this to happen. Skype deserves credit for stopping the illegal activity so quickly. However, I'd prefer that Skype send me an e-mail for confirmation whenever account changes such as signing up for Auto-Recharge are requested. And obviously if an e-mail account change is requested I should get notified at my old address as well.
This certainly showed me that I need to be more vigilant about protecting any account that is linked in any way to my bank and credit accounts. I had considered Skype to be a very low risk account, but that changed when I signed up for SkypeOut.
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a good feature would be ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:a good feature would be ... (Score:4, Funny)
What does the pope's can have to do with this?
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Yes I have experienced it... (Score:4, Interesting)
.. In my opinion skype is being hacked enormously. If you have a skype client open it is also a gateway to your computer. I had never put my credit card # in skype's billing database, but I DID have it on my computer in a text file, my best guess is that Skype is being massively hacked and be weary of using the skype client on your computer if you value your security.
Re:Yes I have experienced it... (Score:5, Funny)
but I DID have it on my computer in a text file
This is a problem, because anyone who got access to your computer would have access to your CC number.
To avoid this security hole, rather than keeping my CC number in my computer, I keep it on a small plastic card in my wallet.
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Re:Yes I have experienced it... (Score:4, Insightful)
Fascinating. Can we see the evidence you base this opinion on? If Skype is indeed being "massively" hacked, there must surely be a massive mountain of readily available evidence?
A quick google finds me plenty of angry, barely coherent forum posts by folks warning all their school friends about trojan-hacker-virusses spreading via Skype calls. I also find a not-unsurprising crowd of unfortunate users who blame Skype for genuine problems on their unpatched, unfirewalled XP-Home box.
The most serious looking warnings I find are mostly of two types. (1) warnings to businesses about the dangers of letting your employees install a secure, encrypted, peer-to-peer, file-transfer system (Skype) on work computers and thereby leak company information. (2) a whole bunch of scam sites using the same cut'n'paste text to misleadingly label the W32.Warezov email trojan as some kind of Skype-based virus.
I don't find - at first glance - a whole lot of serious articles from trusted sources claiming that Skype is a wide-open gateway to malware hell.
Nonetheless - as a Skype user and general security-concerned geek - I'd always be interested to hear genuine evidence that Skype is a security hazard to users who would not accept random file-transfers of from unknown Skype contacts.
Lets not forget that FUD is FUD even when it's not directed against Linux.
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Re:Yes I have experienced it... (Score:5, Funny)
but the three digit code is there as proof that I am holding the actual card. If I memorize it I will have broken the entire security model.
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Nothing to worry about... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
> How many people/organizations are one simple fuckup away from making a raft of cryptic
> charges to your credit card?
Very few. If such a thing were to happen I would contact the bank and inform them that the charge was unauthorized and I refuse to pay it. In my admittedly limited experience the bank will then charge the amount back to the merchant and demand that he prove I authorized the charge.
> How many more people/organizations could(and possibly already are) tacking on little
> charges he
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I'm not sure I agree...
I've had problems with credit card charges in the past (three times in the last six or so years) and because of the consumer protection laws that CC companies are forced to comply with, it was essentially painless to fix--leaving aside the time for a single phone call and filling out the snail mail form they sent. They aren't allowed to require you to pay fees or disputed amounts. If they're trying to stick you with this, you need to let your state AG know.
I reconcile my credit card s
Biling (Score:5, Funny)
I am with Skype/Paypal Customer Service Biling. Please submit your account and credit card info hear and well ensure all refunds will be examined. Thank you
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I'm sorry, that sort of attempt at biling fraud makes me puke.
transaction processing (Score:4, Interesting)
This is what happens when you have technical people (especially not-so-competent technical people) handling financial transactions.
Workflow for payments and other financial transactions should come from your source document (it doesn't have to be a literal document, it can be an authorization entry, etc). The accuracy of the data capture at this point is essential. If you use a key value to grab most of the data needed, validation needs to be very strong.
Source --> Data Capture --> Validation --> Set-up of transactions --> Validation --> Execution --> Data capture of results --> Validation --> Update file --> Validation
I personally have seen many failures because of errors in validation, and the ensuing mess as well-meaning people try to correct the error. Nothing like 36 db entries and half a wasted day just to correct a single error that a user offshore made overnight, then compounded with the "helpful" input of his team members... and then the ensuing clusterfuck of explaining to the client what had happened, what we'd done to ensure it wouldn't happen again, and many, many apologies.
electronic access to your accounts is crazy (Score:2, Insightful)
I know it can be convenient, but I think it's just crazy to let anyone directly charge your CC or worse yet, your bank account.
The era of buggy software which can make enormous mistakes quickly, hacked software which is out to get you, and corporate overlords who look at their customers as the enemy, makes it far to risky to grant them such access.
I won't do it.
Even if it's a CC and you can get it fixed, it's going to be a hassle.
Dreamhost (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
really tried to figure out how to not have it happen again.
What, getting caught?
High Priority... (Score:2)
Friends don't let friends use skype.
Your conclusion doesn't follow.. (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't understand why this occurrence would make you want to avoid automatic payment systems... You didn't sign up for the automatic payment system in this case, and you still had a problem.
Clearly the not using the automatic payment system doesn't help you avoid this problem. In reality, there is no way to NOT give a company permission to charge your account repeatedly whenever you pay for something online... (unless you use one of those one time credit card numbers). I don't think it is practical to advise never paying for anything online, so you always run the risk of accidentally being charged the wrong amount. The only prudent action is to always monitor your accounts to make sure all the charges are legit.
Not just auto billing but also direct deposit (Score:2)
I avoid anyone dipping their fingers into my accounts and mucking things up.
Back when direct deposit was starting to become more common, a former girlfriend was paid that way and found her checking account overdrawn when they made an adjustment. (And no, they wouldn't cover the overdraft fees.)
Now sure, she shouldn't have relied on her balance statement alone, and nowadays some of us create separate accounts for those things, but it's much more of a hassle to try to track and keep accurate records and shif
NEVER EVER EVER (Score:4, Insightful)
Give ANYONE direct witdrawing access to any of your bank accounts, or they will one day use it as their personal piggy bank.
Even if you only deposit what you owe them in the accound, you will face overdraft fees.
Anyway, that is an ugly hack in the age of internet bill paying. All my bills are paid (a) on a credit card if it cannot be avoided OR (b) registered in my bank portal so I can send a payment at my leisure. The two options give me full control of who gets how much, and when.
And in the event of a dispute about the amount owed, I can still pay the rent because I only have one call to make to initiate a chargeback. I know people who got their main account emptied by Bell after an "error". If Bell cannot be trusted, who can?
Everybody makes mistakes... (Score:3, Insightful)
Although I believe that all unauthorized charges to my credit card have been refunded, it is worrisome that Skype, or anyone, would charge my account erroneously.
Companies make errors all the time. I suggest you spend a few moments reviewing your statements when they come in. It is pretty obvious when mistakes are made, and they seem to happen most often with cellphones.
This is one reason I like to stick to paper statements. It reminds me to look at them when the bill comes in.
Agree-to-this! (Score:3, Informative)
A little over a year ago I moved from FL to MD and I had DirecTv. I moved for a job with short notice so my fiancee and I had to move in with her mother for a month until we found a place. The DirecTv followed us to MD for free, but when we moved to our condo there was a problem.
DirecTV doesn't state it online but when you move using their "Movers Connection" you've agreed to extend your service by 6 months, and you've agreed not to move again for those same 6 months. If you do move or cancel within those 6 months they charge you the full cost of your original move plus fees...and they charge your card automatically!
Like I said there was no notice online of such a stipulation, nor did the agent who set up my original move inform me of that criteria. My card was charged $600 4 days before my wedding putting me overdrawn and causing my rent to bounce...putting me down an additional $1500...and I had to pay for some things for the wedding. When I questioned DirecTV about the agreement they said there is no place to view it online, they dont have a document to send, but they assured me that I did, in fact, agree to some silly agreement by moving in the first place.
This story is relevant to the posting because of the automatic withdraw. If they billed me that is one thing, I could call them and work it out, but instead they automatically took money off of my default method of payment simply because it was there. How is this OK with people?! Eventually I got all of my money refunded and a full apology from DirecTV for the hassle...needless to say Im with Verizon FiOS now.
This whole thing burns me up. I think Penny Arcade summed up our collective frustration nicely here [penny-arcade.com]. I have been working on creating a wiki to translate user agreements to plain English so we can all get an easier glimpse at the crap we're agreeing to, and the "rights" we forfeit to our utilities etc. Furthermore the site will branch off into areas where those who are commonly disadvantaged can come together to take legal action against companies who blatantly violate their privacy (like Skype did in the post) or their right to know what they agreed to (like my DirecTV situation). Government is supposed to enforce what we the people deem morally just, yet it seems that whatever the government deems legal we all assume is moral...that doesn't make sense to me. Its about time we started revisiting how we're conducting ourselves in my opinion.
Skype's Billing and "Plans" need overhauls! (Score:4, Informative)
Then my account shut down. I was talking to a relative and the call dropped. I attempted to call back, Skype came up with an error message saying I needed to purchase "Skype Credits". Which from reading the plan, I knew I didn't need. I thought maybe it was a bug or lag, so I relogged Skype, dialed again, same problem. I get more curious and hit the Skype support forum.
A few searches showed people with a similar error. Except it's not an error, it's Skype bending customers over a barrel. Apparently, there is a hidden clause, and I do mean hidden cause it is NO WHERE in their Terms of Service or any policies they have online, that states any account signed up with the "Unlimited" calling plan has a limit of 6 hours of talk time a day. Now you're thinking "ok that sucks but it's still good for $2.95 a month, free long distance, just call back the next day." WRONG. If you exceed your 6 hour limit, which YOU have to monitor yourself, your account becomes null and void. You can't use it anymore. When the next month comes around, the next billing period if you are using more than per-month payment, they will reset all accounts and you can then again use your account.. So I spent $2.95, talked 6 hours, then my account was just void for 31 days. This was not stipulated anywhere on their website and even their forum moderators who help people with technical support stated "Skype is currently working on revising our ToS to include this 6 hour limitation.".
Now again I know what you're thinking, if they didn't tell you about a policy for a service they offer, how can they hold it against you? They do. They will NOT issue you a refund, they will NOT make any exception about the matter, hell they act like the user is supposed to be psychic and know this. Granted, they may have updated their information since January of this year but at the time there were hundreds of threads on their forums about this, dozens of people out money. I had to resort to buying two more additional accounts since my first one got closed, just to make sure I had enough talk time per day. Every 24 hours the "limit" is reset so if you talked for 5 hours 58 minutes on Monday, Tuesday at 5pm EST it is reset so you can use it another 6 hours.. So my two accounts gave me 12 hours just ya know, to get around their HOUDINI-like ToS..
Last I saw several people were considering a class action lawsuit about it on their forums. If that ever happens who knows, I mean yea I know someone will mod this down and be like "QQ more it's only $2.95". Sure, that's a small fee for free long distance in North America but when you buy something labeled as UNLIMITED ya know, ya don't expect a 6 hour LIMIT.
Re:Yet you did it. (Score:5, Informative)
FTFS
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Re:Yet you did it. (Score:4, Insightful)
Same thing happened to me; I had the automatically recharge unchecked, but the payment confirmation indicated thank you for using automatic recharge. Didn't worry too much about it, but Skype is definitely having some issues in the billing department...
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
But it looks like he gave it to Paypal, then gave his Paypal info to Skype.
And PayPal will automatically deduct money from your bank account when you set up a subscription unless if you configure it not to. I had then overdraft $100 from my account when I didn't kill off the auto renew.
Re:Yet you did it. (Score:4, Insightful)
so is it paypals fault you didn't turn off the auto renew? You need to make sure that you turn off auto renew or keep enough cash in your account to cover afew extra hundred bucks.
This was a long time ago when I was unemployed and living in my parents basement digging through the couch for change to pay for gas money to go to job interviews. I never said it was paypals fault, as well.
Also, fuck you.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Redundant)
But it looks like he gave it to Paypal, then gave his Paypal info to Skype.
So now Skype can do whatever they want with his money?
Re:Yet you did it. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Yet you did it. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Yet you did it. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Yet you did it. (Score:5, Insightful)
The power rests in the ability of the individual to rectify this. He can stop using the corporation's services, remove personal information, etc.. You have no such ability in regards to the government.
That's the theory. In practice, lots of these companies act as complex monopoly-type webs and you are forced to deal with some of them no matter how much they suck (e.g. ISPs in some places). Just like dealing with the goverment, except that there's no way to get rid of them at all.
Virtually every company has some sort of unacceptable T's & C's - like including the clause that they can change the T's & C's at any time without notice. And they've already grabbed public goods (like easments) many years ago so you can't even set up in competition to them if you have the money.
Paypal doesn't quite fall into this category, although I have been completely unable to buy certain goods because I refuse to have an account.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"The first message from Skype thanked me for setting up their "Auto-Recharge" service which automatically purchases Skype credit when the balance falls below a certain amount. This was very suspicious, as I had never requested this service."
Re: (Score:2)
How does Skype touch your bank account unless you give Skype the information concerning your bank account? OP was not referring to the auto-bill he was referring to the fact that the author grosses about how distrustful he is of auto-billing yet has already setup his account with his bank info stored on their side rather than doing the more 'cautious' method of not doing so and simply providing it each time.
In other words, he's calling out the minor hypocrisy in the author's statements.
Re: (Score:2)
Bad idea. Very bad idea (Score:5, Informative)
And this is why you NEVER, NEVER give your bank account information to anyone, let alone PayPal (PayPal motto: screwing buyers AND sellers since 2002)
If you must use PayPal--and I concede that it's barely imaginable that there's something you just have to buy that you can only get online and that is only sold by a site that only takes PayPal--you link your account to a credit card. Then if PayPal screws you, you contest the charge and they can take it up with American Express or whoever.
Under no circumstances does any online business get my checking/savings account info. If they don't take credit cards, I'll find somewhere else to shop. The inability to block charges from creating an overdraft and the lack of consumer protection that banks give account holders make this something that no one should ever do. Combine those faults with the dangers inherent in a recurring charge system and it's a no-brainer: don't give PayPal (or anyone else, especially anyone with as bad a customer service reputation as they have) your bank account info.
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Re:Bad idea. Very bad idea (Score:4, Informative)
Except on accepting the terms with Paypal you waive your right to contest credit card charges against any charge made from Paypal.
http://www.paypalsucks.com/credit-card-waiver.shtml [paypalsucks.com]
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
I dont think legally theres any difference between taking money illigitimately WITH a payment system or without one.
Then you would be wrong. Taking money illegitimately without a payment system is intent to commit wire fraud and taking money illegitimately without a payment system could just be a billing error. Intent is important, especially when bringing criminal charges.
Re: (Score:2)
Went to use my card the next day. Declined. Checked online, I was at least $2,000 overdrawn. I noticed that the furniture chain had charged my card twice. Called the bank. She noticed who it was and said that "it definitely wasn't the first time [said chain] had had billing errors where they ran batches twice on Friday and reversed on Monday"...
I wonder how
There is a difference (Score:5, Informative)
If they take money from your credit card without you authorizing it, you can contact your credit card company and request a charge back. If you already have a payment plan, however, you have essentially pre-authorized payments, which makes getting the money back much more difficult.
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