HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. — Gift cards are a billion-dollar business during the holidays, but you may have bought a worthless stolen card without even realizing it.

Thieves are stealing the activation codes and other data from the card. They are then monitoring those cards for activation and wiping out the balances seconds after they are purchased.

Jack Garthwaite says he and his mom purchased six $100 iTunes gift cards at Target.

Garthwaite says he took advantage of a Black Friday deal where Target offered a $20 gift card for every $100 spent on iTunes cards. Several days later, Garthwaite, a college student, says he attempted to use the cards to buy his dad a new phone.

“I tried to redeem the first one, and Apple was saying it had already been used. So, I tried the next one same thing, next one same thing,” he said. “My heart sank. I was like, this is bad.”

Garthwaite contacted both Target and Apple about his worthless gift cards.

“Apple was able to confirm it was not on my account; that I did not redeem them,” he said.

According to an email from Apple to Garthwaite, the cards were redeemed minutes after purchase. But Garthwaite said Target did not refund his money.

“Tried to talk to the manager, and he pretty much shut us down,” Garthwaite said. Adding that the manager told him there were “no refunds on gift cards. ”

ABC Action News reached out to Target to ask about Garthwaite’s claim. Days later, a spokesperson responded in an email:

“After looking into the information provided, our guest relations team reached out to Mr. Garthwaite and provided a full refund for the gift cards purchased."

“I was very happy about that,” Garthwaite said.

Gift cards hanging on racks out-in-the-open may be vulnerable to tampering, so you should buy gift cards online whenever possible.

This story originally reported by Jackie Callaway on abcactionnews.com.

The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) has doled out hundreds of billions of dollars in COVID-19 pandemic relief to businesses in Florida and across the country. But a government watchdog found more than $70 billion may have been lost to fraudulent claims.

Kraig Key discovered a thief used his identity to apply for one of the loans. Key says all his personal information including his Social Security number wound up on an application for a PPP loan filed with the Small Business Administration last fall.

Key, who has worked as an engineer with the same company for the last 20 years, says he's never applied for a pandemic relief small business loan. But in 2020, he began receiving statements showing he owes $7,000 to the SBA.

“It's kind of shocking when you actually see it in print,” Key said.

The SBA’s own watchdog report, released last October, says the agency may have paid over $70 billion in fraudulent and ineligible pandemic relief loans.

“To expedite the process, SBA 'lowered the guardrails' or relaxed internal controls, which significantly increased the risk of program fraud,” the report stated.

Congressman Gus Bilirakis says a congressional oversight committee is working to ensure the SBA implements anti-fraud controls.

“There needs to be multi-level verification there's no question,” he said.

The SBA responded to an email. In a statement, the agency wrote, “New enhanced checks put into place by the Biden-Harris administration have intensified system validations used to mitigate the occurrence of fraud."

Keys and his wife Mara say they called the SBA for months, filed a fraud report and contacted lawmakers for help.

“No one helped us; no one told us where to go!” Mara said.

After contacting the SBA on Kraig Keys' behalf, the agency contacted him saying the issue would be resolved, Keys said.

If you or anyone you know suspects fraud related to a PPP or a disaster relief loan contact OIG’s Hotline at 800-767-0385 or online at https://www.sba.gov/about-sba/oversight-advocacy/office-inspector-general/office-inspector-general-hotline.

This article was written by Jackie Callaway for WFTS.