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| Watch out for foil scammers/ Flickr CC via Judy ** |
Small businesses beware: an item that can easily be
found in a kitchen drawer is now being used to steal from stores and gas stations.
A new robbery effort has thieves using aluminum foil to steal
cigarettes and electronics from small retail shops. The FBI has warned that members
of African criminal enterprises are wrapping foil around parts of satellites
that capture and transmit signals to credit card authorizations systems. The
foil helps to block communication between banks and stores, preventing
validation for a transaction.
A participant of the scheme simply has to climb onto the roof of the store
and place the foil on the “feed horn” a part of the satellite antenna stores
use to contact banks and credit card companies to approve a transaction. Retailers
still permit sales even if the link with banks is down, assuming that the
transactions will go through once the connection returns.
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| Flcikr CC via Robyn Lee |
Criminals then buy high-priced items such as phones or
cartons of cigarettes using stolen credit card numbers. Instead of getting an
instant approval by banks, stores are told they cannot be reached and trust that
they will be verified later when the connection is back up. When the store
realizes the theft, the thieves are long gone. Stores are thus left to handle
the losses.
Two people were arrested in West Virginia in October trying
pull off the scheme. The pair was linked to more than 600 stolen cards and had
stolen more than $10,000 worth of cigarettes and electronics found in their
vehicles.
Criminals have been targeting victims in Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio,
Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. The stolen items are taken to New York, where
they are sold at pawnshops or exported to Africa, according to a podcast by the FBI’s Mollie Halpern. Retailers should consider
installing extra security measures or surveillance equipment to combat the foil
scam.
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