QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked."

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GaryBne

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Jun 23, 2011
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It seems that hundreds of QF accounts have been locked, forcing a pin reset.

Last night I could not log into my FF account - not on PC, app and nor by phone. Pin reset on line didn’t work either.

The Service Centre could reset my password in a pleasant and efficient phone call this morning and its all working again. Nothing missing. The reason for the lockout is usually fraudulent activity (e.g. buying/ selling points) or too many failed logins. Neither was true in my case.

It seems I was not the only one. The call centre have been inundated with similar calls since yesterday and a report has been escalated. My hypotheses are :

1. There was some programming stuff up in an upgrade they did yesterday – killing all the PIN’s. if so its another example where QF is Jekyll and Hyde - 5 star in the air and “tiger” in the IT department

2. The IT Department decided to kill any pin that had not been changed for ages - forcing some supposedly better security. But in an IT type of arrogance didn’t notify the Service Centre in advance - causing an overload of work and delays for the QFF call centre and alienating the loyal customers just a little more.

3. There has been a massive security breach with the system hacked and QF and as a result IT had to delete all the passwords (PINS).


I suggest every member tries to log on - it would be interesting to hear how many have been locked out. If its 100% then hypothesis 3 is likely as is #1. If you were not locked out, and your pin is less than a year old, then its looking like hypothesis #2.

Any thoughts?
Gary


PS - I could not call the QFF Service Centre last night. Earlier in the day the wait time was long but the recorded message said they were open 7am -7pm AEST. That’s untrue. Its 7-7 AEDT and I called at 6:20 BNE time (AEST). Sigh.
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

No problems logging in here.
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

No issue here... Haven't changed PIN for years...
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

No problems here either.
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

You know, login attempts don't have to have come from you.

This is correct - could the OP have left a Boarding Pass somewhere by mistake?
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

You know, login attempts don't have to have come from you.

yes, true and one for consideration, though I was told that this was not what seemed to have happened in my case. Though I'm not sure how the agent would know that.

in any case the sudden surge in PIN reset calls is not just random ...
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

It seems that hundreds of QF accounts have been locked, forcing a pin reset.

Last night I could not log into my FF account - not on PC, app and nor by phone. Pin reset on line didn’t work either.

The Service Centre could reset my password in a pleasant and efficient phone call this morning and its all working again. Nothing missing. The reason for the lockout is usually fraudulent activity (e.g. buying/ selling points) or too many failed logins. Neither was true in my case.

It seems I was not the only one. The call centre have been inundated with similar calls since yesterday and a report has been escalated. My hypotheses are :

1. There was some programming stuff up in an upgrade they did yesterday – killing all the PIN’s. if so its another example where QF is Jekyll and Hyde - 5 star in the air and “tiger” in the IT department

2. The IT Department decided to kill any pin that had not been changed for ages - forcing some supposedly better security. But in an IT type of arrogance didn’t notify the Service Centre in advance - causing an overload of work and delays for the QFF call centre and alienating the loyal customers just a little more.

3. There has been a massive security breach with the system hacked and QF and as a result IT had to delete all the passwords (PINS).


I suggest every member tries to log on - it would be interesting to hear how many have been locked out. If its 100% then hypothesis 3 is likely as is #1. If you were not locked out, and your pin is less than a year old, then its looking like hypothesis #2.

Any thoughts?
Gary


PS - I could not call the QFF Service Centre last night. Earlier in the day the wait time was long but the recorded message said they were open 7am -7pm AEST. That’s untrue. Its 7-7 AEDT and I called at 6:20 BNE time (AEST). Sigh.

Do you use AwardWallet by any chance?

I was having a similar issue a few weeks back. I had AwardWallet set up but hadn't saved my password - preferring to update it manually when I logged in (just in case their system is compromised). Anyway, I ended up disabling the account in AwardWallet altogether. Within 24 hours, the account locked issue had stopped occurring. I suspect that what was happening is that the AwardWallet system was repeatedly trying to login to update my account, but with no PIN saved, it was just locking me out.

Anyway, just a theory, but if you don't use AwardWallet, please ignore. :)
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

interesting news .. but no I don't have award wallet
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

Just logged into 3 family members account... no issues :)
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

No issues logging into either of our accounts
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

Message:

"We are currently unable to process this request currently. Please try again later."

:rolleyes:
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

No problems here. PIN not changed in over a year or two. Or is that three?
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

No problems here at all. Haven't ever changed my PIN.
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

mine's fine. My 1234 PIN worked perfectly :D

(that's a joke folks)
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

Message:

"We are currently unable to process this request currently. Please try again later."

:rolleyes:

Still getting same message. I successfully changed the pin and after getting SMS confirmation, tried again. Same message.

So I call QFF premium line. Entered all details etc. Got a chap who said there were no site issues that he's aware of; seemed to think I needed to use telephone pin change; I argued the toss, saying that I just successfully changed my pin, but gave in and he transferred me to telephone pin change. I entered the number, repeated it and .... got a recorded voice saying that there was a problem. I swore, and the telephone chap it seems was still there :oops: and I'm now on hold.

After a few minutes, chap comes on and says he'll look further and call me back.

Edit: OK, it works with Chrome, so probably a IE issue. I suspect the Work Experience kids have been tinkering again and left behind their fingerprints.
 
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Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

No problems logging in here .... same pin
 
Re: QFF Accounts Hacked or IT stuffup? "Your Frequent Flyer account has been locked

Do you have any Phone apps that have your QF Credentials and automatically log in periodically? (eg things like TripIT, points aggregators etc etc).


It's possible one of these is repeatedly attempting to log in using out of date credentials and therefore locking you out.
 
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