Orange Internet Clients Being Billed Unknowingly

Apparently when subscribing to an Orange internet account the default settings allow online purchases using two services called Internet+ and Contact+. These services allow some websites to charge amounts to your Orange account that will then be added to your invoice at the end of the month. The idea is that this avoids having to enter credit card details to make purchases for small amounts. It seems however that there may be some abuse of these services on certain websites, either intentional fraud or a situation where it is not clear to the user that a service is paying; this is particularly relevant to anyone who gives their WiFi password out to a large number of people, for example, chalet or bar owners who offer it to their guests.

Unless you specifically wish to use the service for online purchases, it is recommended that you deactivate these two services in your client account “espace client”. If you find that you have a regular payment going out every month from one of these services then you will also need to cancel the “abonnement”.

Furthermore, there may be security issues related to your Orange account. When you subscribe to Orange internet services you are given a login and password, by default this login is an email address such as xxxxx@orange.fr. Anyone connected to your WiFi is automatically connected to your Orange.fr account (your “espace client”), meaning that they have access to all your bills, private information, the ability to modify your Orange account (including the settings discussed above), add new services etc. The only way to avoid this automatic login is to add a second email address within your “espace client”, so that anyone attempting to login will be asked for a password.

This information was kindly supplied by Running Repairs, if you need advice or assistance regarding the above issues you can contact them using the website link at the top of this article.