My mom sent an email that many of you may already have seen, that starts like this:

My husband was called on Wednesday from "VISA" and I was called in Thursday from "MasterCard". It worked like this: Person calling says, "This is Carl Patterson and I'm calling from the Security and Fraud department at VISA...

As with most really amazing/frightening/incredible e-mail I get periodically, this one has made the rounds for quite some time:

There's no way to verify whether this anonymous, first-person account is authentic, but the type of fraud it warns against is real enough, so the message is worth heeding even if it is slightly misleading.

It's misleading in that it gives the impression that this type of scam is brand new and only pertains to the three-digit security code now found on the backs of most credit cards.

It seems the only real difference between internet fraud and any other sort of fraud is that the theives can steal stuff from you faster. Or, in too many cases, you get bamboozled into providing the wrong information faster.