Exercise for card cloning began way back on Jan 10 – Times of India

Lucknow: Probes into the case of mass debit card cloning have shown a common plot. Officials investigating on what appears to be the biggest cyber-heist reported in the city have found two ATM booths maintained by leading public sector banks had been tampered.

Collating crime data on a series of similar frauds, sleuths discovered that all victims had used their cards either at ATM booths located in Shakti Bhawan or Ashok Marg, the two busy locations in Hazratganj. Digging deeper, they found that all the victims had used their debit cards on January 10.

Well aware of the loopholes, the miscreants duped close to 80 victims from April 1. Banking guidelines makes it mandatory for financial institutions to preserve CCTV recordings for 90 days. In this case, the 90-day period ended on March 31 and fraudulent transactions were initiated immediately after the period got over.

"We believe the gang used a skimming device and installed a camera to record PIN codes discreetly. The devices were installed and removed within 16 hours on January 10," said additional superintendent STF and cyber expert Triveni Singh who is working on the case closely.

Though banks are supposed to guard ATM booths in order to protect customers from fraud, it was only three months later that they realized something was wrong when multiple complaints started pouring in on a daily basis. Post that chief manager of State Bank of India, Ashish Mishra lodged FIR against the unidentified miscreants lodged at Hazratganj police station on April 5.

Though the victims held the debit card in their possession, they realised that fraudulent transactions were done through fake ATM cards in Vadodara, Gujarat. Miscreants remained at work 1,100km away from the city between April 1 and 6 and used the confidential data they had managed skim on January 10 to dupe city residents of lakhs of rupees. At least 24 victims are government employees.

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Probes show miscreant installed skimming devices at two ATM booths

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Exercise for card cloning began way back on Jan 10 - Times of India