Reported by Epaynews.com
May 08 2008 : In 2007, ATM fraud losses rose by 43 percent in Europe to €439.01 million (US$683.7 million) from €306.48 million in 2006, reports EAST (the European ATM Security Team). Most of the losses in 2006 and 2007 were due to card-skimming at ATMs, the non-profit organization says.The year-on-year increase in fraud losses was mainly due to a €173.6 million increase in cross-border losses in 2007.
“These (cross-border) losses are occurring globally in countries where all or part of the ATMs deployed are not yet EMV-compliant,” EAST says. “Domestic European fraud losses have fallen year on year, an indication that the roll out of EMV-compliant ATMs is driving down fraud.”
According to EAST, 78 percent of European ATMs are now EMV-compliant.
Card fraudsters are being forced to seek out non-EMV compliant ATMs to obtain cash, EAST says. “Incidents continue to be reported where data skimmed from EMV cards in European countries where ATMs are EMV-compliant, has been sent by criminals to European countries where ATMs are not fully EMV-compliant,” it says.
The skimmed data is used to make counterfeit cards that enable fraudsters to illegally withdraw cash from ATMs.
According to EAST, skimmed data is also increasingly being sent to countries in and outside Europe where EMV cards can be used as magnetic-stripe cards in ATMs. This takes advantage of a process known as “mag-stripe fallback”, which is designed to ensure that a card can be used even if its EMV chip is damaged or faulty.