Over the past few hours, some Google Pay/Wallet users have received an erroneous “You added a new card to your Google Account” email.
From the dozens of reports so far, it’s clear that the people that received this message did not add a new credit or debit card to Google Pay.
Rather, a bug on Google’s end is causing expired payment methods that even have old addresses to reappear. There are some reports of cards currently in use appearing, while a few people say they are seeing unfamiliar payment methods, though this isn’t confirmed.
The email is one you do normally receive from Google after saving a payment method. A version of that message from 2020 is below:
Those impacted by this issue are receiving multiple notifications in a row. That said, this does not appear to be a widespread issue in that not every Google Pay user is getting this email.
As a refresher, “Google Pay” is what you’re using when making a transaction online or on your phone with cards that you’ve previously saved. Google Wallet is the Android app that stores those payment methods, tickets, IDs, etc.
People are understandably alarmed by the email given that it’s related to financial information and banking, with Google needing to clearly explain what exactly happened. From what we know at the moment, this seems more like database bug on Google’s end rather than any sort of compromise or “hack.”
Visit wallet.google.com to see what cards you have saved.
We’ve reached out to Google for more details.
Updating…
Thanks tipster
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