Some News
Security Risks at Fake ATM Machines
Fake ATM machines are not new, but awareness of them is. Have you ever gone into a locally owned gas station that has a small ATM sitting in the corner near the chocolate bars? Not all of them are real. They read card information, allow the person to enter their PIN, display a dummy message saying that the transaction cannot be completed at this time. All the while, it’s harvesting all the cards information to be used at a later time. Some fake ATM machines even have a camera to capture a photo to associate with the card information. We need to pass this information along among ourselves, our families, our friends and our customers. Captured information can be used to recreate a complete identity along with a bank account with funds in it.
Some good news … Albert Gonzalez, the Miami man who stole and resold 170 million cards and ATM numbers, has pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing in March.
Increases in Phishing Attacks
Identity theft is expected to increase again this year. With the bad economy in 2009 came a huge reduction in the workforce. Many of those who were unemployed invested in starting online businesses to make ends meet. These unskilled “webmasters” may have great ideas, but many are uneducated in privacy and security leaving identifiable information out there for criminal minds with access to the Internet. Names, addresses, phone numbers, notes on prospective clients all are jumping off points for spear phishing attacks.
There were many phishing attacks against financial institutions in 2009, about a 600-percent increase over phishing attacks in 2008. Spear phishing is becoming more popular as hackers target businesses where an attacker can access business accounts and initiate money transfers via wires or ACH to steal large sums of money at once or over time.
In: Security · Tagged with: atm, hackers, id theft, information security, infosec, phishing, Security