We took my parents to Vegas for the Thanksgiving weekend. While waiting for lunch, my dad received a call from his credit card company asking about several thousand dollars of suspicious charges made recently at a travel agency. Nope, not him- someone got his CC number and made some charges for travel to some exotic places.
He had only used that card once in the past few days- at a gas station in Vegas.
So it sounds like someone installed a reader on one or more gas pumps and sat nearby waiting for people with out of state plates to use their cards. They probably figured that anyone from out of town wouldn't be home for several days (especially over the long weekend), so the thieves would have several days before the card would be reported stolen.
Lessons learned:
1) Beware when you swipe your card through a reader that's not monitored by employees. Or don't swipe it at all. (I rarely use a CC to pay for gas.)
2) When you travel, make sure your credit card companies have your cell phone (or make sure you can check your home answering machine/voice mail remotely- and check it frequently).
