BENGALURU: Two foreign nationals were arrested on charges of stealing details of ATM cards at Kempegowda International Airport.CID said that they arrested Dan Sabin Christian (40) of Romania and Mare Janos (44) of Hungary at around 10.30 pm on September 12. The duo had allegedly installed skimmers – devices that read data on an ATM card – on eight occasions at five different cash dispensers in the city.
CID officials said they were acting on a complaint filed by officials of Kotak Mahindra Bank, which eventually led to the arrests. Police gathered inputs about another skimming device installed at a Kotak Mahindra ATM at the airport. A team inspected the place and established the presence of a skimmer and a miniature camera installed inside the cubicle. From noon onwards on Tuesday, the team kept vigil at the said cash dispenser. Around 10 pm, the two suspects arrived at the ATM. CID said that the accused grew suspicious and booked a cab to leave, without retrieving the skimming devices. However, they were caught by the police before they could get away.
During questioning, it was revealed that the two accused were part of an organised crime gang based out of UK. They used to collect information, including PIN codes of ATM cards and store it in memory cards. They then shared it with gang members.They are said to have arrived in India on September 1. Cristian and Janos were scheduled to fly to the UK on September 19. CID recovered skimming devices, a laptop, a hard disk, memory cards and card readers from them. The duo would spraypaint the skimming devices before installing them to match them with the colour of the ATM kiosk. The installation was done in the mornings, and required only a few minutes.
“The travel documents of the accused showed that they had travelled to USA, Mexico, Guatemala, Philippines, Jamaica, France, Argentina, Uruguay etc. They had been barred from USA and Jamaica. We will share details with other nations, and try to get more information through Interpol,” CID Director General (DG) Kishore Chandra said. They have been remanded to custody till Sept 22, he said. Last year, a Romanian duo involved in ATM data theft in Kerala and another Romanian national in Chennai were arrested in two incidents.
Cover keypad while typing PIN: Top cop
CID Director General (DG) Kishore Chandra requested all those who had swiped their cards at the five cash dispensers in question, to change their PINs and notify their banks. Chandra also suggested that citizens cover the ATM’s keypad while typing the PIN code, which would help hide the PIN in case of a hidden camera.
HOW DUO STOLE DATA
The duo would first spray-paint the card-skimming device and a pin hole camera with the same colour as the ATM kiosk.
They would then attach the camera above the ATM’s keypad and the skimming device behind the spot where the card is inserted.
After user swiped his card, they would remove the camera and the device and get the PIN codes, card numbers and the CCV codes of the cards.
They would then send all the data to their associate in the UK