At Least Someone Is Watching

I think the most frustrating part of watching the news is being forced to accept which stories they decide to go overboard when covering versus the ones which they only mention in passing. As you probably guessed, the reason I find it so frustrating is that the news and I never seem to agree on which the most important stories are. For example, in my opinion the fact that Christmas is just two days away doesn't constitute actual news, just one fact out of many. Meanwhile, I think the story that someone compromised Target's security and may have gotten the personal information of 40 million people is kind of a huge deal and yet the item only got a passing mention on most newscasts. Think about it like this - all these thieves have to do is take two dollars from each person (who would never know about because we are hit with so many bank fees that we would just assume it was from one of them) and they have stolen $80 million. That would make for one hell of a heist movie and yet the story disappeared from the news almost as quickly as it appeared. I will concede reporters don't have much to go on since police haven't named any suspects or even told us how these hackers managed to worm their way passed security (I'm going to guess it had to be an inside job). However, the fact these reporters have so many unanswered questions should be causing them to break out their old-school reporter instincts but instead they don't seem very interested in getting to the bottom of things, especially when some celebrity could have scandalous pictures taken of them at any minute.

I tell you this much, the credit card and banks certainly seem to think this security breach is a big deal because they are out in force letting people know they need to monitor their cards and watch for suspicious activity. I have already gotten two emails from my banks asking if I shopped at Target recently and when I went online to pay a credit card bill I was met with a bright red warning bar going across the top of the screen where people should go if they fear their information was hacked. These companies don't want to deal with the headaches unless they have to and catching any suspicious transactions before they go through is the best way to do that. Of course, it would probably help if people just didn't shop at Target for a couple of weeks but that's a problem for someone like me who is trying to balance personal security with getting the perfect gift. I had an idea in mind for someone and while I was doing my pre-Christmas reconnaissance I had only seen it at Target. I should have bought it online weeks ago but clearly that ship sailed and now if I wanted this thing by Wednesday I was going to have to go to the store and buy it. I spent all day shopping around, desperately trying to find this item at another store which hadn't been dealing with such huge security breach but all this did was end up screwing me over because not only was I going to have to go to Target to buy the item, now I was going to have to use my debit card because I had used all my free cash in other stores and my bank comes up woefully short when it comes to available ATMs. Admittedly, it was not a well thought-out plan of attack on my part.

As I was waiting to pay I tried convincing myself I would be fine doing this, telling myself lies such as this was probably the best time to buy something at Target because they would have spent the last week beefing up security to the point their firewall was impenetrable. It's like eating at a restaurant the day after it re-opened after the board of health shut it down for having too many violations - surely they cleaned everything up or else they wouldn't have been allowed to re-open and they will be on their best behavior in the coming weeks because the board of health will be watching. However, all that confidence was shattered less than fifteen minutes after I left the store when my bank called to inquire about my debit card being used at Target. Apparently they don't have as much faith in the security at the store and wanted to make sure I was the one who used the card and they even made sure to ask about the other two times I had used the card during the day. According to the woman on the phone they just wanted to confirm I was actually the one making those purchases and that I was willing to accept the charges. Thankfully the stuff I bought was the only activity on my card (though I'm going to keep an eye out for the next couple of weeks just to make sure). It was kind of unnerving because no one had ever called to check something like that before. For a half-second it made me feel like I was stealing money from myself and I thought about returning the gift in favor of something else. I obviously didn't but after I hung up I started thinking about all the other purchases I have made in my lifetime and I have to say, I kind of wish someone from the bank called me every time I bought something.

Don't get me wrong, I am not saying that I want to have to worry about the security of my ATM card after every transaction. What I am saying is that I'm made some dumb purchases in my life and it would have been nice if someone had called me at that moment and asked me if I really wanted to do this. When I think back to all the stuff I bought that I never used I can't help but to wonder how much of it would have remained on the shelf if someone from the card company had called a couple minutes after I had swiped through to ask if I really wanted to buy that item. Buyer's remorse can be a powerful deterrent and I probably could have been swayed into returning many things which I never ended up wearing/using nearly as much as I envisioned. I mean, how many tickets to Celtics games did I buy when the team was going 15-67? That is money that could have been better spent elsewhere because there was no need for me to watch a team which was trying to lose for draft purposes in person and if someone from my bank had reminded me of this I would have saved some money. I wouldn't want the bank to have final say over how I spend my own money but most of the time I am shopping alone and every now and again it would probably serve me well if there was someone there who stopped me before I even got to the car and asked when was the next time I planned to use this thing I just bought. Think of like a real-life version of having an angel on your shoulder. I'll say this much - so far my bank certainly seems more interesting in making sure that I don't get ripped off than my local TV news screw is.