Video: A Card Skimmer Was Installed in 3 Seconds

Posted By Anna on Apr 18, 2016 | 2 comments

Not so long ago we wrote about tricks the fraudsters use for credit card frauds or identity thefts (and then, of course, for stealing money). But it is one thing to read, and quite another – to see. Thanks to the video record, recently put on the Internet by the Miami police, we can estimate the high “professionalism” of the crooks installing a card skimmer on the POS terminal.

The video was recorded in a store at the petrol station. The fraudsters worked in tandem. While one was distracting a seller, another installed an ATM skimmer on a payment terminal at a cash register. His speed is particularly striking as it took him only 3 seconds!

The skimming was not successful only by sheer luck. A pad on the terminal was placed a bit askew, an employee noticed it and called the police.

We would like to remind that the credit card skimming is a way to steal money placing a special pad on the ATM or a POS terminal. Usually, it is a copy of the ATM keypad fixed on a top of the original one. When a credit card is inserted into the ATM or POS-terminal with a skimmer, the skimmer records the credit card data. The owner of the card doesn’t notice anything. For him, the transaction is carried out in a regular mode.

After that, the fraudsters withdraw the credit card data. They take a skimmer away or use a remote reader. Further developments can move in two main scenarios. The fraudsters either use the compromised bank card data to pay for Internet purchases or make a copy of this card and withdraw money from the victim’s account using the ATM.