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Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Thu Mar 08, 2012 3:01 pm
by Burn
I only mentioned a date, you pointed out what it was for. :wink:

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Thu Mar 08, 2012 3:29 pm
by Sid Burn
the ONLY way to make yourselves heard is to close your accounts.
Stop debating this and use the only relevant tool in this kind of situation, your wallet.

Are TF collectors as a whole, so desperate for a repainted pair of generation wheeljacks that they will put up with this loss of personal data?

Many of you have mentioned that this is an e-commerce site without realizing the solution is within that simple statment.

TFCC is about making money, if enough of us close our accounts (as I did) then TFCC will start making real changes to keep themselves relevant in the collectors community.

as long as you are all still waiting with baited breath for these exclusives, they have no incentive to do more than the bare minimum to shut us all up.

CLOSE YOUR ACCOUNTS!

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Thu Mar 08, 2012 8:04 pm
by Seibertron
Sid Burn wrote:CLOSE YOUR ACCOUNTS!


How do you close an account for which was already pre-paid for a year?

If you're looking for any announcements to be made about their contract being ended or canceled, I wouldn't look for any announcements about that until after the conventions are completed. As an avid completionist of the Transformers brand, I shouldn't be punished for being a collector nor for trying to have my voice heard.

I think we're being heard loud and clear ... Hasbro appears to be listening. They've probably got their hands tied right not and I imagine situations like this are a corporate nightmare. I'm not certain what can be done until after BotCon and GIJoeCon, but after that I think anything is fair game ... especially depending on when Fun Publication's contract is up. If Hasbro renews the contract, then in my opinion they've condoned all of this to a certain degree. If they don't renew the contract, then we know that they wanted to cut the hassle and any losses/bad PR, and that they did hear us.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 12:08 am
by DevastaTTor
Devastattor; the latest victim of the Great FunPub Credit Hack of 2012.

What a -bleeping- hassle. I'm in Singapore this week for business and started getting all kinds of frantic calls from my wife about this. Having to do damage control while overseas has totally sucked.

This was my first foray into membership in the TFCC. It will definitely be my last.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 12:17 am
by Kibble
DevastaTTor wrote:Devastattor; the latest victim of the Great FunPub Credit Hack of 2012.

What a -bleeping- hassle. I'm in Singapore this week for business and started getting all kinds of frantic calls from my wife about this. Having to do damage control while overseas has totally sucked.

This was my first foray into membership in the TFCC. It will definitely be my last.

That sucks and I'm sorry to hear, but why hadn't you already canceled the account with all the info you have been given on the matter? If anyone else has read this and is waiting it out, it's futile to do so. Do it now before you have to deal with fraudulent charges. It's not a matter of if, but rather when otherwise.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 2:49 am
by DevastaTTor
Kibble wrote:
DevastaTTor wrote:Devastattor; the latest victim of the Great FunPub Credit Hack of 2012.

What a -bleeping- hassle. I'm in Singapore this week for business and started getting all kinds of frantic calls from my wife about this. Having to do damage control while overseas has totally sucked.

This was my first foray into membership in the TFCC. It will definitely be my last.

That sucks and I'm sorry to hear, but why hadn't you already canceled the account with all the info you have been given on the matter? If anyone else has read this and is waiting it out, it's futile to do so. Do it now before you have to deal with fraudulent charges. It's not a matter of if, but rather when otherwise.

If I didn't have to travel all the time for work lately, I probably would have. However, the simple "cancel everything" solution just wasn't an option for me due to the timing of all this. Best I could do was monitor everything daily until I was home next week and then cancel things.

Time was not on my side this time.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 6:08 am
by Sid Burn
Seibertron wrote:
Sid Burn wrote:CLOSE YOUR ACCOUNTS!


How do you close an account for which was already pre-paid for a year?


they issued me a refund based on how many months I had left on my membership, $30 of my fee was returned to me. They put up no fight whatsoever.

This is the problem with these forums, all of you debate what hasbro thinks, what TFCC thinks etc etc, but its all based on nothing, thin bits of info taken from corporate style responses.
hasbro issued a safe, corporate response removing them from responsibility, TFCC has been issuing responses to cover their own asses as well.

the reason hasbro will renew TFCC as a license holder is based on their PROFITS! nothing more, if the data loss issue equals a loss in profits, they will weigh that against the overall profits of the club.

if you all continue your huffing and puffing over this, but then sit patiently waiting for your battlechargers and shattered glass repaints, I can assure you TFCC has little to no motivation to do anything but a simple mod of their existing site.

not sure why that is hard to understand, the license's Hasbro gives out on their products are a function of profitibility, nothing more.

TFCC knows as well as Hasbro does that nostalgia is a powerful sales tool, that is why we have seen TF exclusives moving from obscure characters who make a nice addition, to main characters that are needed to complete a line.

we should be insulted that the TFCC is so confident in holding us hostage with nostalgia that they can actually be combative about losing our data.

I am telling you all, as long as you follow the TF consumer treadmill like sheep, they have no reason to better their user experience, only close the hole they left on the site.

that site is going to continue looking like a reject from 2001, the shipping times from TFCC will continue to be slow, the customer support will continue to be aloof and the price for a few 'fanzines' and a toy will continue to be too high.

vote with your money, its the only thing that a business will hear. Do any of you actually think that TFCC cares about your inconvenience past the point that it hinders their cashflow via online revenue or botcon attendance?

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 6:32 am
by AutobotMR2
Sid Burn wrote:
Seibertron wrote:
Sid Burn wrote:CLOSE YOUR ACCOUNTS!


How do you close an account for which was already pre-paid for a year?


they issued me a refund based on how many months I had left on my membership, $30 of my fee was returned to me. They put up no fight whatsoever.

This is the problem with these forums, all of you debate what hasbro thinks, what TFCC thinks etc etc, but its all based on nothing, thin bits of info taken from corporate style responses.
hasbro issued a safe, corporate response removing them from responsibility, TFCC has been issuing responses to cover their own asses as well.

the reason hasbro will renew TFCC as a license holder is based on their PROFITS! nothing more, if the data loss issue equals a loss in profits, they will weigh that against the overall profits of the club.

if you all continue your huffing and puffing over this, but then sit patiently waiting for your battlechargers and shattered glass repaints, I can assure you TFCC has little to no motivation to do anything but a simple mod of their existing site.

not sure why that is hard to understand, the license's Hasbro gives out on their products are a function of profitibility, nothing more.

TFCC knows as well as Hasbro does that nostalgia is a powerful sales tool, that is why we have seen TF exclusives moving from obscure characters who make a nice addition, to main characters that are needed to complete a line.

we should be insulted that the TFCC is so confident in holding us hostage with nostalgia that they can actually be combative about losing our data.

I am telling you all, as long as you follow the TF consumer treadmill like sheep, they have no reason to better their user experience, only close the hole they left on the site.

that site is going to continue looking like a reject from 2001, the shipping times from TFCC will continue to be slow, the customer support will continue to be aloof and the price for a few 'fanzines' and a toy will continue to be too high.

vote with your money, its the only thing that a business will hear. Do any of you actually think that TFCC cares about your inconvenience past the point that is hinders their cashflow via online revenue or botcon attendance?


He has a valid point guys. The less money we give these...incompetent...people, the less likely we will have to worry about them in the future. Hasbro is to large a company to invest in a contract with people that won't make them money...and might actually lose them money in the long run. I can honestly say that no matter who the exclusive is, until I see a change in "ownership" in the Club, I will have nothing to do with it. And Seibertron I do understand your point you made earlier, but honetly I just don't have , well any faith in these guys to fix this whole mess.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 8:04 am
by Sid Burn
exactly, I dont like it being this way, but it is this way.

I certainly wish that the TFCC and Hasbro held our memories up as something to be cherished, but they actually use them as a tool to sell us more bots.

TFs are not referred to as plastic crack simply because they are cool, it also has to do with the pushers (hasbro/TFCC) being extremely skilled and experienced using our own nostalgia against us.

this is all fine up to a point, I certainly dont want transformers to go anywhere, but when we endure a loss of privacy, security and safety from the TFCC and STILL line up for more...

well, that makes us the fools, not them.

if you walked into a business, bought something, and they let you know that your personal data had been lost with the transaction due to negligence, would you be in a hurry to continue buying from that store?

but if completing your G3 lineup is SO important that you will actually endure the loss of your personal data, then expect more of this nonsense in the future.

maybe that can be another level of exclusiveness for the TFCC to market?
'this exclusive is limited to 500 pcs worldwide and to obtain one, you have to risk identity theft making it even MORE exclusive!'
:HEADHURTS: :BANG_HEAD:

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 9:42 am
by AutobotMR2
Sid Burn wrote:maybe that can be another level of exclusiveness for the TFCC to market?
'this exclusive is limited to 500 pcs worldwide and to obtain one, you have to risk identity theft making it even MORE exclusive!'
:HEADHURTS: :BANG_HEAD:



Sounds like they are well on their way to this idea....and it's sad. I have only been in the hobby of collecting for a few years now, but I have loved Transformers since I was a kid. And I'm sorry, but I'm not gonna put my family's future financial stability in danger just because these idiots couldn't front some money from the rediculous ammount they make off of us to provide the security needed to protect our financial and private information.

As far as I'm concerned FunPub is dead to me, and they will stay that way. Only because I have no faith that anything will come of this other than "woops" and "my bad".

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 9:48 am
by Court Jester
Sweatshops, identity theft, corporate greed and American job layoffs - and I'm still lining up to throw the last of my cash at 'em. I'm done with it. The juice ain't worth the squeeze. I won't even ask for a refund... just keep the change.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 10:09 am
by Sid Burn
Court Jester wrote:Sweatshops, identity theft, corporate greed and American job layoffs - and I'm still lining up to throw the last of my cash at 'em. I'm done with it. The juice ain't worth the squeeze. I won't even ask for a refund... just keep the change.


agreed, I asked for the membership to be cancelled and refunded to get my information wiped.

that is another reason I forgot to mention.
cancelling your account will force TFCC to wipe your info.

if you dont want any more hassles, cancel your account so your info is no longer on their site.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 10:46 am
by Tigertrack
Court Jester wrote:Sweatshops, identity theft, corporate greed and American job layoffs - and I'm still lining up to throw the last of my cash at 'em. I'm done with it. The juice ain't worth the squeeze. I won't even ask for a refund... just keep the change.


It's unfortunate that you still think the working conditions are of the 'sweatshop' variety when one made that claim, and HASBRO made clear that they do not have the poor working conditions that were alledged.

That's the problem with negative articles. The retractions are always on the last page...and the damage is done.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 11:23 am
by Seibertron
Sid Burn wrote:
Court Jester wrote:Sweatshops, identity theft, corporate greed and American job layoffs - and I'm still lining up to throw the last of my cash at 'em. I'm done with it. The juice ain't worth the squeeze. I won't even ask for a refund... just keep the change.


agreed, I asked for the membership to be cancelled and refunded to get my information wiped.

that is another reason I forgot to mention.
cancelling your account will force TFCC to wipe your info.

if you dont want any more hassles, cancel your account so your info is no longer on their site.


It doesn't force them to wipe your info. My assumption is that all of the transactions are stored in a database, which they probably need for accounting purposes.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 12:24 pm
by AutobotMR2
Well that's just wonderful, I'm pretty sure they thought about putting some sort of security software in place to protect this info....then they said "Eh, we will get to it later."

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 1:14 pm
by Sid Burn
Seibertron wrote:It doesn't force them to wipe your info. My assumption is that all of the transactions are stored in a database, which they probably need for accounting purposes.


I specifically asked Angie at funpub about this when I cancelled, she assured me that all data would be wiped from the site upon cancellation and refund of my membership. I will follow up on that but it really isnt the point.

I have yet to see anybody counter the idea that the best way to show TFCC your dissatisfaction is to close your accounts. I dont think some of you hardcore G3 collectors(not flaming, I am a hardcore G1 collector)want to acknowledge that doing the logical thing here might conflict with you purchasing a few exclusives.

You cant have it both ways, either you dump funpub, secure your personal data and show them that these recent events are unacceptable (thereby forcing them to make changes to save their business)

or

you can get your runamuck and runabout and continue to operate under the threat of data loss.

if you want to continue rewarding bad behaviour, that is your business.

but please dont assume hasbro is hearing us or that TFCC is trying to make things right, there has been no evidence of that other than some copy pasted politically correct statements from hasbro and TFCC.

and we all saw how quickly the funpub rep got combative.

if they REALLY wanted to correct the issue, they could have hired someone and had their site overhauled 10 times by now. The fact that the busted site is still up and partly functional shows a decided lack of response on their part.

they should have pulled the entire site and replaced it with a funpub logo graphic until they had the site redone.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 2:03 pm
by chuckdawg1999
Food for thought. When Hasbro pulled the license from 3H FunPub was already in the picture since they were doing JoeCon. There isn't anyone in the picture now to take over for FunPub and more importantly, who would want to?

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 3:13 pm
by AutobotMR2
chuckdawg1999 wrote:Food for thought. When Hasbro pulled the license from 3H FunPub was already in the picture since they were doing JoeCon. There isn't anyone in the picture now to take over for FunPub and more importantly, who would want to?



Hence why this club is dead to me, no matter what the exclusive.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 6:26 pm
by Stormrider
Seibertron wrote:
Sid Burn wrote:CLOSE YOUR ACCOUNTS!


How do you close an account for which was already pre-paid for a year?

If you're looking for any announcements to be made about their contract being ended or canceled, I wouldn't look for any announcements about that until after the conventions are completed. As an avid completionist of the Transformers brand, I shouldn't be punished for being a collector nor for trying to have my voice heard.

I think we're being heard loud and clear ... Hasbro appears to be listening. They've probably got their hands tied right not and I imagine situations like this are a corporate nightmare. I'm not certain what can be done until after BotCon and GIJoeCon, but after that I think anything is fair game ... especially depending on when Fun Publication's contract is up. If Hasbro renews the contract, then in my opinion they've condoned all of this to a certain degree. If they don't renew the contract, then we know that they wanted to cut the hassle and any losses/bad PR, and that they did hear us.



So it sounds like our best option if we are not satisfied is to write letter of complaints to Hasbro?

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 7:11 pm
by TransBat
I've been watching all of my funds like a hawk since Seibertron first alerted us to the issue, and found out this evening that I too am now another victim of the security breach. Keep close tabs on your funds everyone - the card in question (which has now been cancelled) was only used once when I went to my first/only BotCon in 2010 :(

I'm not looking to add any fuel to the fire here, as I'm just as appalled as the bulk of you are about how our security/information was handled. Just wanted to give everyone a heads up to still be diligent about watching their credit/debit cards, you could still end up a victim.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 7:20 pm
by robofreak
TransBat wrote:I've been watching all of my funds like a hawk since Seibertron first alerted us to the issue, and found out this evening that I too am now another victim of the security breach. Keep close tabs on your funds everyone - the card in question (which has now been cancelled) was only used once when I went to my first/only BotCon in 2010 :(



Wait, are you sure that card was only used for Botcon 2010? If that's the case, then the breach in security has been going longer than just this incident.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Fri Mar 09, 2012 7:27 pm
by TransBat
My apologies, I just went back and reviewed my records, and the cancelled card in question was actually used twice at the TransFormers Collectors Club, once for BotCon 2010, and then late April 2011 for 4 deluxe Generations figures that were on sale at the time. I believe it was mentioned (or was it surmised?) that the hackers potentially had access to all previous records, hence the recommendations to cancel any card used with the Club in general.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Sat Mar 10, 2012 1:03 am
by Seibertron
chuckdawg1999 wrote:Food for thought. When Hasbro pulled the license from 3H FunPub was already in the picture since they were doing JoeCon. There isn't anyone in the picture now to take over for FunPub and more importantly, who would want to?


CybertronCon is looking pretty good to me right about now. The people that are running that have been great to work with. They treat us with respect, present us with interview, photo, and press opportunities, get us into events as media, and seem to be doing what they should be doing with sites like Seibertron.com. You know ... actual public relations. Hopefully Hasbro is taking note.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Sat Mar 10, 2012 1:26 am
by Burn
When FunPub got the licence, their tech was most likely up to date.

They just neglected to move with the times.

Re: TF Community Warning: Check your Credit and Debit Card accounts for recent fraudulent activity

PostPosted: Sat Mar 10, 2012 1:34 am
by Seibertron
Burn wrote:When FunPub got the licence, their tech was most likely up to date.

They just neglected to move with the times.


You mean when they got the G.I. Joe license? :D