Cash machines were bugged with MP3s in £200,000 scam

[SUBMAN1]

Careful of cheap cash machines where you can hear the tones being transmitted. This would be really easy to do too. Just pop the MP3 recording on the back of the machine and record the tones that are transmitted to the bank – you could get everything you need from pin numbers to account information. Ouch!

I am never using a free standing cash machine again – I am only going to use the ‘in-wall’ versions.

-X

http://money.guardian.co.uk/news_/st...948027,00.html

Cash machines were bugged with MP3s in £200,000 scam



David Ward
Wednesday November 15, 2006
The Guardian
A man who used MP3 players to bug cash machines and steal the personal details of unsuspecting bank customers has been jailed for 32 months. The sophisticated technical scam secured data that enabled Maxwell Parsons's accomplices to use cloned credit cards to buy £200,000 of goods in high-street shops, Minshull Street crown court in Manchester heard.


The scheme, put into action before chip and pin cards were introduced, is thought to have been the first of its kind to be used in the UK. Parsons, 41, from Gorton, Manchester, and his team attached MP3 players to the backs of free-standing cash machines in bars, bingo halls and bowling alleys. The players then recorded customers' data as it was read on their cash cards and transmitted via a telephone line to banks.

[STEED]

Never used the free standing machines only the hall in the wall ones, even them one's you got too be careful with as false fronts are put on by crooks.

[VipertheSniper]

Originally Posted by STEED

Never used the free standing machines only the hall in the wall ones, even them one's you got too be careful with as false fronts are put on by crooks.

Apart from the fact, that here, every button you press on the cash mashine makes the same tone, just deliberatly type in a false PIN code, if the machine is a fake it won't notice and you know you're standing in front of one.

[STEED]

Originally Posted by VipertheSniper

Apart from the fact, that here, every button you press on the cash mashine makes the same tone, just deliberatly type in a false PIN code, if the machine is a fake it won't notice and you know you're standing in front of one.

The problem we got is the machines are the real deal, the crooks put a false front on where you insert your card which is scanned by them.

And don't bother shredding your old bank statements, do what I do burn them it's the only 100% guarantee. On saying that I saw a consumer programme some weeks ago where banks were showed up too be sloppy when they put the rubbish out. Bank customers details not even shredded.

[VipertheSniper]

Originally Posted by STEED

The problem we got is the machines are the real deal, the crooks put a false front on where you insert your card which is scanned by them.

And don't bother shredding your old bank statements, do what I do burn them it's the only 100% guarantee. On saying that I saw a consumer programme some weeks ago where banks were showed up too be sloppy when they put the rubbish out. Bank customers details not even shredded.

You mean the whole front, or just a scanner around the card slot? Because for that that I think we have the easiest solution possible. On all cash machines in the wall outside the bank there are thick transparent plastic bars around the slot, and since you use the cash machine pretty often, I guess you'll get accustomed to that particular look, so when something else is around the slot, it's suspicious. Cash machines in the bank on the other hand do not always have that plastic bars, but they are always under surveillance, so if they'd try it there they'd have to do it quick.

[STEED]

Originally Posted by VipertheSniper

You mean the whole front, or just a scanner around the card slot?

Card slots. The crooks attend to favour the off the main road banks or around the corner hole in the wall ones from what I heard, no machines in the bank has been done.

[Konovalov]

Originally Posted by STEED

And don't bother shredding your old bank statements, do what I do burn them it's the only 100% guarantee. On saying that I saw a consumer programme some weeks ago where banks were showed up too be sloppy when they put the rubbish out. Bank customers details not even shredded.

A cross-shredder (turns you docs into confetti), should be more than sufficient if you do not have an open fire place or pot-belly wood burner.

[STEED]

Originally Posted by Konovalov

A cross-shredder (turns you docs into confetti), should be more than sufficient if you do not have an open fire place or pot-belly wood burner.

Cross shredders have been proved to fail all they do is make it harder to put the document together, granted only the really determined crook will reconstruct it.

[Konovalov]

Originally Posted by STEED

Cross shredders have been proved to fail all they do is make it harder to put the document together, granted only the really determined crook will reconstruct it.

On top of cross-shredding you then split the shredded docs across different garbage bags on different days. For the householder I really don't think you need to go any further than this unless you are either totally paranoid or are yourself involved in criminal activity.

[STEED]

Originally Posted by Konovalov

On top of cross-shredding you then split the shredded docs across different garbage bags on different days.

Good point but how many people think of that one?

Burning the hush, hush paper is 100% if you can. If not next best thing cross shred and mix it up in different bin bags.

Hole in the wall machine are still a problem. :hmm:

[Konovalov]

Originally Posted by STEED

Hole in the wall machine are still a problem. :hmm:

Not practical to most including me but withdraw your money from the bank across the counter and as you walk out the front door get jumped by some hoody attired thief.

[Theta Sigma]

I suspected the tones could be recorded, ala "WarGames", but in case you didn't notice, those freestanding machines need a phone jack for their modems to connect to and transmit those tones.

I've seem many of those phone jacks exposed and ready to have some Y-phone jack added so someone with a phone cord could make a REAL good recording of that information.

If you see two cords going into that jack, I'd be real suspicious. ATMs should have a dedicated line like fire/security alarms.

In fact, the last ATM I saw in that state was in a McDonald's.

[SUBMAN1]

THe cheaper cash machines leave all the tones open for anyone to record. I've listened to it myself thinking that its just a cheap modem in those things, and they 'leave' the friggen speaker on during the tranmissions! Most people wouldn't notice the tones, but anyone with half a brain could just record those tones and decode them later!!! They would have everything they would need to make a fake ATM card complete with your pin number, account information, and everything about you - probably enough information to steal your entire identity let alone your cash!

-S