Charlie Harrow

May 5, 2016

Crooks Go Deep With ‘Deep Insert’ Skimmers

This post was originally published on this siteATM maker NCR Corp. says it is seeing a rapid rise in reports of what it calls “deep insert skimmers,” wafer-thin fraud devices made to be hidden inside of the card acceptance slot on a cash machine. KrebsOnSecurity’s All About Skimmers series has featured several stories about insert skimmers. But the ATM manufacturer said deep insert skimmers are different from typical insert skimmers because they are placed in various positions within the card reader transport, behind the shutter of a motorized card reader and completely hidden from the consumer at the front of […]
August 22, 2017

Dumping Data from Deep-Insert Skimmers

This post was originally published on this siteI recently heard from a police detective who was seeking help identifying some strange devices found on two Romanian men caught maxing out stolen credit cards at local retailers. Further inspection revealed the devices to be semi-flexible data transfer wands that thieves can use to extract stolen ATM card data from “deep-insert skimmers,” wafer-thin fraud devices made to be hidden inside of the card acceptance slot on a cash machine. The investigator agreed to share the photos if I kept his identity out of this story. He told KrebsOnSecurity that the two men were […]
December 5, 2017

Anti-Skimmer Detector for Skimmer Scammers

This post was originally published on this siteCrooks who make and deploy ATM skimmers are constantly engaged in a cat-and-mouse game with financial institutions, which deploy a variety of technological measures designed to defeat skimming devices. The latest innovation aimed at tipping the scales in favor of skimmer thieves is a small, battery powered device that provides crooks a digital readout indicating whether an ATM likely includes digital anti-skimming technology. A well-known skimmer thief is marketing a product called “Smart Shield Detector” that claims to be able to detect a variety of electronic methods used by banks to foil ATM […]