Thank you FluidDjango for posting this. You just saved me money.
After reading this article, I realized this just happened to me. I ignored the messages (From "Brain Cool IQ"), thinking that they were spam. Didn't bother reading them. Thankfully I had not yet deleted them.
The first message, on Mar 8, advertised the service. Then, on Mar 22, I received three messages in a row. The first advertising the service, the second welcoming me to the service and inviting me to cancel with a "STOP" message, and the third with some stupid fact.
In my case, the STOP message, which I sent just about 20 minutes ago, seems to have worked. I got a response claiming I was unsubscribed from messages and fees.
I never subscribed to anything in the first place. This is fraud, plain and simple. In my case, I ignored the first advertisement sent on the 8th. Had I actually subscribed to this service, they wouldn't need to advertise it first. Since their first round of messages on Mar. 8 didn't succeed, I imagine they got bolder and decided to subscribe me (and everyone else in that batch) without my having asked.
Since this was from a few days ago, I cannot check to see if anything was billed to my Verizon account yet. That would show up on the next invoice. I did change my account settings right away, blocking all Premium SMS message services.
I received the three messages while I was reading the linked article! My messages came from "MobibroIQ". I did not respond.
I logged in to AT&T and launched a chat with Technical Support. I indicated in my description that I wanted to place a purchase block for 3rd party services billed to SMS. The entire exchange took about 10 minutes. I received an email for each line on my account indicating the purchase block had been activated and that a PIN code would be required for charges to apply. AT&T reported that the change could take up to 90 minutes to take effect. As I am typing this, I received a message from this "MobibroIQ" stating, "This msg confirms that u have discontinued and will no longer receive messages or charges for this service..."
Again, I did not reply "STOP."
I hope this solution is as painless and simple for you as it was for me.
EDIT: Follow up message from AT&T "To confirm, purchase blockers have been added to all lines and also checked your line #### & cancelled a subscript.charge for $9.99, will see credit next bill"
I got the same thing on the night of March 23, three messages from "brain cool IQ." Verizon can't tell me yet if there is a charge incoming or not, because they can't seem to see charges in between bill cycles.
Comments
Thank you FluidDjango for posting this. You just saved me money.
After reading this article, I realized this just happened to me. I ignored the messages (From "Brain Cool IQ"), thinking that they were spam. Didn't bother reading them. Thankfully I had not yet deleted them.
The first message, on Mar 8, advertised the service. Then, on Mar 22, I received three messages in a row. The first advertising the service, the second welcoming me to the service and inviting me to cancel with a "STOP" message, and the third with some stupid fact.
In my case, the STOP message, which I sent just about 20 minutes ago, seems to have worked. I got a response claiming I was unsubscribed from messages and fees.
I never subscribed to anything in the first place. This is fraud, plain and simple. In my case, I ignored the first advertisement sent on the 8th. Had I actually subscribed to this service, they wouldn't need to advertise it first. Since their first round of messages on Mar. 8 didn't succeed, I imagine they got bolder and decided to subscribe me (and everyone else in that batch) without my having asked.
Since this was from a few days ago, I cannot check to see if anything was billed to my Verizon account yet. That would show up on the next invoice. I did change my account settings right away, blocking all Premium SMS message services.
I received the three messages while I was reading the linked article! My messages came from "MobibroIQ". I did not respond.
I logged in to AT&T and launched a chat with Technical Support. I indicated in my description that I wanted to place a purchase block for 3rd party services billed to SMS. The entire exchange took about 10 minutes. I received an email for each line on my account indicating the purchase block had been activated and that a PIN code would be required for charges to apply. AT&T reported that the change could take up to 90 minutes to take effect. As I am typing this, I received a message from this "MobibroIQ" stating, "This msg confirms that u have discontinued and will no longer receive messages or charges for this service..."
Again, I did not reply "STOP."
I hope this solution is as painless and simple for you as it was for me.
EDIT: Follow up message from AT&T "To confirm, purchase blockers have been added to all lines and also checked your line #### & cancelled a subscript.charge for $9.99, will see credit next bill"
I got the same thing on the night of March 23, three messages from "brain cool IQ." Verizon can't tell me yet if there is a charge incoming or not, because they can't seem to see charges in between bill cycles.