It's tough to say, but think of it like a quote from Fight Club -

"A new car built by my company leaves somewhere traveling at 60 mph. The rear differential locks up. The car crashes and burns with everyone trapped inside. Now, should we initiate a recall? Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one."

That's nothing to do with any company policy regarding the issue. I'm simply talking about one solidarity issue. Always worth reporting to the appropriate company though.

I don't even do that. I hold my hand over it and if the people hovering over me are offended, well, then they can just back the hell off!!!!!!!

After sticking a few of these jerks in jail maybe the number of skimmer scamming incidents will decline.

this should be a new pasttime. Hunting for skimmers on atms. And hang them on your wall like trophies!

@JN2: I believe the correct procedure after no one else will help, and if you can find them is to call the A-Team.

@miburo:

Conspiracy theory minded? No, it's called a healthy dose of skepticism.

Anyone who thinks they should blindly trust the banks needs their head examined.

@josh8241: That would increase labor. Which was what atms were around to eliminate in the first place.

(As an aside, I think that ATM fees were the first step for banks learning that "negative action" fees were more profitable than actually lending money. This lead down the route to huge overdraft fees, automatic overdraft protection, and non-sequential posting of debits etc that we find the banking industry slurping on now.)

@Alessar: Only if the skimmer had a threat to the president written on it...

The FBI is clueless about these "minor" crimes either until a national corporation hand feeds them the evidence of a national scam crew or until the "right" politician is affected and starts screaming...

Compare this to the difficulties they seem to have with data breaches that expose(d) millions of records. This is small fish to them...

With that said, it looks like its time to get online for some card readers and then crank up the old plastic vacuum forming machine make skimmer shells. I am willing to bet that , right now, there is no law against making and selling ATM skimmers- just using them.

I'm sure DealExtreme will get these in soon enough, and most likely for under $10

It takes what, ten minutes?

Just another notch on the post, agreeing with the fact that banks could give jack squat about their customers identity.

That's very narrow conspiracy theory minded... Why even trust the feds then? You see stories about them being corrupt to... or even the government.. you see stories about them too.. or even your neighbor... or your family...

Timeus has been very helpful in his replies if you have read the previous post about skimmers. And he has nothing to do with this certain bank in Atlanta. If he was part of a greedy corporation wouldn't he encourage her to go out and spread the news that X competitor bank had card skimmers on their machines?

The MAIN PROBLEM is that BoA has DOZENS of types of ATMs and they all look different. So it's hard to tell if the ATM is supposed to look one way or another. I think it should be bank personnel responsibility to check every ATM for card skimmers on a regular basis, like everyday. There should be no reason an ATM at a bank location should have this problem. I can understand if it is not a bank location.

@Timeus:
Of course the bank would be notified - by the police whose job it is to investigate crimes. And obviously you're uptight about this story, because you're speaking as a bank employee of some kind. If you actually read the story, you would see that the bank in question didn't want the skimmer from the customer.

And as to "stop being so pessimistic"; how about the banks give us a reason not to be, for once.

@SpongeSteveSquareDave_GitEmSteveDave:
Yes, destroying evidence is a crime. Do you really think that would stop the bank from doing so? How many stories have we read on here about corporations violating the law???

perhaps you could communicate this with your superiors. it sounds like other BOA departments should either know to call ANS immediately upon report of a skimmer, or develop a similar SOP to ensure that the integrity of your network remains intact.

Nope, I wouldn't even attempt to comment on it since that's not an area I work in.

If your luck is bad enough, you're hosed either way.

I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who does this. I feel less silly about it now!

Not only the hidden cameras that have been found alongside ATM skimmers, but people in line behind me make me paranoid as well.

In fact, I remember reading one story about a skimmer a couple of years ago where one guy installed the skimmer, then his lady friend would follow people to the ATM, pretending to be next in line and pretending to send text messages while in line. She was texting the PIN numbers to her partner.

Personally, in some respects, I think banks are no different than the TSA in terms of maintaining a security theater. Perhaps I've grown too pessimistic in this respect, I shudder to think how the banks will use their "latest security procedure" (e.g.: Chip and PIN, if it ever gets implemented here) against us if the crooks find a way to subvert it. God help the first few victims when this happens.

@TShK: ...and we appreciate all that you do, thank you! Stay safe out there.

Anyway, if the money was returned to you I don't see what the problem is. Banks hand out money to people with no ID and just a note saying "Give me money"

For purchases, I almost always use a credit card (I took good care to avoid applying for cards issued by creditors who aren't known for good CS) anyway.

For ATM cash withdrawls, I guess I'm very paranoid. Aside from quickly inspecting the ATM for abnormalities, I have a habit of covering my fingers with a large black wallet and making "scrambling motions" with my fingers as well.

"I asked the police what to do; they said give it to the bank. I asked the bank what to do, they said give it to the police."

That's pretty much what happened to me when I had my identity stolen.

No, you're not the only one.
People in line behind me especially make me paranoid. If I don't feel like I can do that, I do the transaction as credit.

I just get cash back when I make a purchase. It's easier than trying to find an ATM that won't charge me a fee because it's not my bank.

What about Bank of America tellers who give out money to somebody who presents ONLY a driver's license, and yet, tellers don't demand a bankcard, demand that the person punch in a PIN, or check the person's signature?

On seven separate occasions, in Texas and in California, B of A's tellers gave out my money ($12,000 total) to women who presented ONLY a fake driver's license in my name -- with the wrong expiration date.

I investigated and it seems B of A's computers aren't connected -- at many branches (a highly expensive procedure when a bank has gobbled up a bajillion little banks). According to my investigation, in many cases, the tellers CANNOT check these signature or read your bankcard; they just HOPE it's you.

When I complained about this -- instead of just saying, "Oh, okay!" to B of A's apparently making their customers more attractive victims to identity thieves with such practices -- the bank sent me a letter firing me as customer and telling me I had about a month to get my money out.

Any comments on this level of "security"?

I guess I'm paranoid, but I hit the keys with all four of my fingers held together so it's not clear which finger is hitting which key. Or I hold my four fingers together over the keypad and hit the key with my thumb, tucked under the fingers.

I just wondered if anyone else did that, too.

I've called the number on the ATM to report ATM problems (for TD Bank, not BoA) and the attitude was as close to "we don't care" as possible.

In this case, someone had attacked the three ATMs at my bank, destroying the card slot on one, another one was permanently stuck on "TEMPORARILY OUT OF SERVICE" and the last one the card slot had been damaged enough that I was the last customer that managed to use the thing. The ATMs were, however, repaired after a day or two (Perhaps because they were attached to a bank, I can't imagine it had anything to do with my call with the attitude I got on the phone). I switched banks a while after.

Another, separate, experience calling a similar number for Bank of Montreal when a few rolls of their proprietary receipt paper had been left lying around all night also resulted in the same uninterested attitude. I also switched banks over this one. I mean, seriously, do you really want it to be this easy for criminals to forge bank receipts? *sigh*

Note to banks: Take people calling your ATM numbers seriously. Or not. Up to you. I'm now with a bank that seems to give a crap (for the moment).

@Timeus: Good advice-thanks.

@masterying01: Yeah, with my luck, I'd go "Hey! A skimmer!" RIIIIIIP...and then the defacing an ATM charge.

@Blueskylaw: Until the skimmed cards are actually used, there isn't any theft or loss by any "victim". There is no such thing as "attempted theft" and "theft" of a number is not a theft until it involves actual loss. This would have to come under a computer crimes or a fraud statute...and most district attorneys don't like to prosecute those because they're too complicated for juries to understand.

@Timeus: In fact, you shouldn't even be touching the damn thing, so you don't destroy any physical evidence there might be.

Despite what you see on TV, prints off something that is in public are just about useless in court. That includes the outside of a car, outside of a window, etc.

That said, I'm sure that's why they chose that UPC prefix. Or random chance. I'd guess the latter.

The bank has to tell these people what to do with them, a lot of the time. Some PD will hold the device as evidence while our investigations unit tries to build a case and find out who was responsible, some PD simply destroy it, it seems to vary frm one police department to the next.

We do not simply throw it away and hope no one finds out. Stop being so pessimistic please. The bank has "everything" to do with it. If we get notified, we can begin notifying all potentially effected customers and begin the process of safeguarding their accounts. If we don't get notified, potentially hundreds, maybe thousands of accounts are at risk for fraud depending on how busy a particular ATM is.

We have procedures for situations where an ATM skimming device is found. There's almost always a number on the ATM to call in the case of any emergency, that goes directly to our Corporate Security Department. They will contact us, unless a customer gets to my department first via Customer Service. We would immediately shutdown the ATM, dispatch a Second level technician to the site to evaluate the situation, remove the device, and send out a Privacy Event Notification to our investigations department as well as dispatch the police to meet our vendor tech on-site. We would also pull all ATM logs and submit that information with the Privacy Event Notification to notify all customers who were potentially effected.

In the future, if you ever come across a skimming device on an ATM, if you have the time, I know we appreciate a call to be notified. In this case, if anyone in my Department was notified about this device pictured above, and no one took action, they would lose their job. Trust me when I say, when a device is found, "alarm and whistles" go off in my department, upper management is notified and everyone gets involved.

Diebold (the mfgr of most of the ATMs out there) has changed their designs lately to make it more difficult to install these things but it's not impossible.

Common sense rules. If it looks suspicious, don't use it.

Anyone here from law enforcement that knows what crime has been committed by this and what should be done by all parties concerned?

@rbb: The consumerist story that ran a few weeks ago referenced a site that had photos of skimmers installed on the ATMs. They were extremely difficult to spot in most cases. You can view the pics at: [www.networkworld.com]

Believe me, I check every time now, but it's still hard to figure since there's no standard.

So the scammer is a girl into tennis, or someone going out with someone who plays tennis. Can't blame them of course, girls in tennis outfits are hot. Unless they let themselves go.....

"I assume that no one has established standard procedures to handle this kind of thing yet"

The skimmer is evidence of an attempted crime against you. As the victim, you have standing to file a criminal complaint.

In my opinion, the bank has nothing to do with it, and the police should be immediately notified. In fact, you shouldn't even be touching the damn thing, so you don't destroy any physical evidence there might be.

Giving it to the bank will probably mean they throw it away and keep it quiet so people don't get scared to use their ATMs.

Its basically impossible to use a scanner without some way in which they can hack it without the bank taking a PRO-active measure of checking the scanner every couple of hours.