The phone call took me off guard. I juggled my expression from delight to disbelief and apprehension to understanding as the lady explained to me in detail what just happened. Apparently, someone tried to use my credit card data to book a flight in one of the Scandinavian airlines, but the super, ever-vigilant MasterCard preemptively blocked the transaction after noticing the unusual activity. Time to rejoice, right? Well, no. Call me a diehard cynic or a crazy skeptic but I have reasons to suspect that this foul play was MasterCard’s brainchild itself.

First, at the very least, I am a sensible and disciplined credit card user who has never used the card at any unsecure point of purchase (PoP). Given the fact that I have traveled a lot recently in Europe and paid for my trips using the same credit card, it is surprising that the Mastercard sensed this “fraud” that was similar to my past purchasing patterns. After all, doesn’t a credit card transaction mean just using the card details? Or do they somehow sense who exactly is using the card too? If that were the case, they should have caught my brother first who also uses my card occasionally. And finally, even if I agree that someone hacked my credit card details and that MasterCard somehow figured out the abnormal purchasing pattern, why would the hackers, who are usually a bunch of smart geeks, use it at the stupidest place where they are most likely to get caught? I mean transaction is not everything; you need to get some benefit out of it also, right? It is easier to get some material benefit out of a grocery store than getting on and off of a flight that was booked using a stolen credit card. And yes, mine is a low limit card too. Didn’t the hackers figure that out and instead tried someone else’s before mine? Chances are I will notice a few grand missing from my statement before Paris Hilton would.

Bottom line, I suspect anything happened other than MasterCard trying to create a halo image for itself OR there was a glitch in the system or something. I remain suspicious.