More than $1000 stolen through Uber

An Auckland student is warning Uber users after her account was hacked by people overseas.

Auckland student Melissa Hu, 22, says she was hacked last month through her Uber account. She suspects Russian fraudsters took more than $1000.

The Auckland University student said she noticed a red flag when her details were altered without her permission.

In a Facebook post Miss Hu said: “I noticed my name change from Melissa to Mel and my email changed to my university email. I had updated Apple Pay that same day with the same information it changed to, so assumed this was just automatic syncing.”

Uber Help warns an indication of a hacked account is information changing without your knowledge.

“They took different amounts sporadically. On May 5 there were heaps of different withdrawals; one was $5.60, another was $210, and then $23…and it continued to happen,” Miss Hu told Te Waha Nui via email.

“The transactions in my bank statement also had conversion rates to Russian rubles in them.”

Miss Hu banks with ASB and said the bank was working on retrieving the money.

Miss Hu said on the Facebook post she was not the only person to contact ASB, as others had fallen victim to similar scams.

ASB was unable to comment.

“So far I’m needing to provide evidence of which payments were mine by providing every Uber receipt emailed to me, so I can match them up with bank statements and figure which ones were fraudulent,” said Miss Hu.

“People really need to be more vigilant to the subtle changes in anything and be extra cautious if any changes are made without your authorisation.”

A research document shared by a security analyst in 2016 revealed more than a dozen flaws in the popular ridesharing app, allowing hackers to access driver and passenger information.