The scourge of skimmers

Debit Card
When will Chip-and-PIN come to the U.S.?
May 3, 2016
May 2016 Tip of the Month
May 17, 2016
Debit Card
When will Chip-and-PIN come to the U.S.?
May 3, 2016
May 2016 Tip of the Month
May 17, 2016

If you have paid attention to the news over the last several years you have probably heard about a rash of credit card skimmers being placed on payment terminals and ATMs. These have become an epidemic all over our country as thieves are migrating to the last remaining major economy still using magnetic strip cards (to be fair, skimmers are being discovered to steal EMV card information too). This is one of the most significant problems to face the credit card industry today.
Skimmers are small pieces of technology that are installed out of sight on top of a credit card reader to read the magnetic strip (or some new ones even read chips) when a customer uses their card at the terminal. Sometimes a small camera or a fake keypad is also installed to obtain a PIN number. Early on skimmers looked out of place but as time evolved they have become much more sophisticated. The thieves place the skimmer many times when a business is closed (think a bank on a Saturday or Sunday) and retrieve them at a later date as they are battery powered. Many thieves are not American citizens and then leave the country with all of that stolen information in tow and law enforcement here can do nothing about it at that point. Thieves can then sell the card’s information and/or have counterfeit cards made.
So how can you spot at skimmer? The rule of thumb is to question anything that looks out of place. Many terminals like gas pumps post a picture of what the pad looks like in case there is a question about it and you can also compare it to other terminals if there are some to compare it to. If something feels loose or the color is off err on the side of caution. Many skimmers have a lot of give to them to allow for easier retrieval so give it a tug, normal card readers should not move.
As a business owner how can you combat this? Perhaps the most important thing you can do is to upgrade to the new chip POS readers if you haven’t already. Should the thief acquire the card’s information their use of it will be limited as the chip creates unique transaction information that will limit what a thief can do with the card. Of course that is little help to anyone who has not received an upgraded EMV card yet and as that has not occurred, keeping magnetic strip readers is a must. Another thing you can do is to be vigilant and to have your employees be vigilant and educate them to know what this technology looks like. They are the first line of defense and if a skimmer is spotted early a great deal of fraud can be stopped and the scammers can be caught when they come back to retrieve it. It could be the difference between your business taking the negative publicity for a skimmer being installed (not to mention what your customers could have to go through) and the thieves spending up to 20 years in prison.