Verizon Customer Service: Security Adventure
April 19th, 2006 | by amarfresh |Last Sunday I left my phone up in Wayne, NJ where I celebrated Easter with some close friends. Bummer. I was halfway home before I realized it. No big deal; TJ would be coming down this weekend and I could get my calls forwarded to my Sprint Ambassasdor phone.
No problems. After calling customer service, Verizon gladly forwarded my calls to my Samsung A920.
Thiry minutes ago, I was looking for a phone number which I knew could be found in my cell phone records. I tried logging in to myVZW and (as usual) my account was locked and they needed to send me a temporary password via SMS. Unfortunately SMS messages are not forwarded by Verizon. My password seemed not to work, so I called CS…
Apparently they can no longer unlock web accounts over the phone. They wouldn’t SMS it to me nor would they email it to the address on the account. No amount of account or personal information was good enough- account password, SSN, billing address, last number called, nothing. I could have showed them my DNA codec and they still would not have unlocked the account for me. They could only offer to mail (snail) a password to me- but only after having removed text messaging from the account?!?! According to the CS rep, this procedure is only a few weeks old.
I understand phishing and security. I have passed the CISA exam. It seems absurd that they are willing to forward calls and (possibly still) activate equipment with the standard security questions, but were not willing to do the same for unlocking my internet account.
Does anyone from Verizon Wireless read this blog?
One Response to “Verizon Customer Service: Security Adventure”
By sonia monroy on Apr 24, 2006 | Reply
i had a similiar situation i lost my phone i tried to access my account online and yeah the account was locked i usaaully change my password every month i forgot it this time did the samething give all sorts of info and the passwords that i used for the account no deal i have alot of contacts on that phone that i needed that were on redail that i cant remember i have to wait until my next billing cycle to get the phone # i desperatly needed i feel your ssn# should be enough the entire ssn# noone should have that info and the phone company can verify like u that