NY Duo Arrested for Skimmer Scam; Here’s How to Keep Your Info Safe
Two men were arrested in connection with a credit card skimmer scam. Do you know how to spot one?
News 10 is reporting that two men were arrested today after being accused of setting up credit card skimmers at gas pumps designed to steal credit card information from customers in Fonda, NY. The good news is, the skimmers were found early and the FBI helped local law enforcement prevent any data breach and catch the accused.
Ever since credit card skimming started to become a common 'thing', I've been pretty wary about them. Gas pumps and any public ATM make for easy targets. Sure, a lot of credit cards have good security these days, but even if your credit card company provider notices suspicious behavior and alerts you to the attempted purchases, you're still going to have to go through the trouble of canceling your card, getting a replacement, and changing all your subscriptions that automatically use that card, like Netflix, Amazon, and whatever else you happen to pay for regularly.
Credit card skimmers are physical objects, so you can be on the lookout for them when using any public credit card reader.
The typical ATM skimmer is a device smaller than a deck of cards that fits over the existing card reader. Most of the time, the attackers will also place a hidden camera somewhere in the vicinity with a view of the number pad in order to record personal-identification-numbers, or PINs.
Because the skimmer has to be installed, you can try a few things to see if one might be present. PC Mag suggests you...
Pull at protruding parts like the card reader. See if the keyboard is securely attached and just one piece. Does anything move when you push at it?
Just a couple pokes and prods can detect one of these things, so it can't hurt to spend just a couple of seconds that could end up saving you a major headache at best or a stolen identity at worst.
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