Visa was sued Tuesday by consumers who said the card payments network failed to make “Vanilla” prepaid gift cards less likely to be stolen by thieves.
Ira Schuman, who is leading the proposed class action lawsuit in federal court in White Plains, New York, said he bought eight $500 Vanilla cards as holiday gifts for his employees in 2022 and 2023, only to learn later that the cards were they had emptied
According to the complaint, non-reloadable debit cards are sold at CVS, Target, Walgreens and other grocery stores and retailers in thin cardboard sleeves that thieves can open and, after recording account information, reseal without be detected.
Thieves can then monitor http://www.vanillagift.com to see when the money has been loaded and make purchases using the stolen account information, according to the complaint.
The scam is known as “card drain.”
Visa was sued Tuesday over a gift card scam. Asia Grace
Schuman, of Scarsdale, New York, said Visa and two vanilla card issuers knew or should have known that their cards were vulnerable to tampering, but they didn’t add security features and didn’t provide refunds when money was stolen.
Visa and the other defendants, Incomm Financial Services and Pathward Financial, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
In November, San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu sued Incomm, Pathward and two card issuers over Vanilla cards. Visa, based in San Francisco, was not named as a defendant.
Tuesday’s lawsuit accused the defendants of violating a New York state law against deceptive and unfair consumer practices.
The scam involves gift cards being emptied before they are redeemed. fake images
It seeks compensatory and punitive damages for people who purchased Vanilla Visa-branded cards in New York since January 30, 2021 and saw their funds depleted.
The case is Schuman v Visa USA Inc et al, United States District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 24-00666.
Categories: Trending
Source: vtt.edu.vn