ATMs – Are They Fraud Friendly?

Automatic teller machines are widely used in Australia today and have become an accepted means of withdrawing cash for our day-to-day shopping activities. They are easily accessible and often save us waiting in queues at the bank. They are convenient, being in many more accessible locations throughout the town or city than banks can provide. But are they safe? It seems that overseas criminals think that Australian ATMs are an easy target. There are two reasons for this. Firstly, Australian banks allow a much larger withdrawal limit on ATM cards than other countries do. This is attractive to criminals because their reward for successful fraud is so much greater. And unfortunately – for us at least ‘ overseas criminals target Australian ATMs because the rewards far outweigh the punishment of a first offender in Australia. Secondly, it seems that Australian ATMs are somewhat ancient ‘ designed in the days before crooks thought up evil schemes to skim them. In other words they do not have the same security features that overseas ATMs have. This makes it much easier for crooks to install those fake card readers. Once installed, the reader sends an electronic message containing all the personal banking details of the person using it, to the mobile phone of the criminal who is safely ensconced in another place ‘ probably with his feet up and sipping a can of our beer. So the next time you use that ATM, be sure to notice if it has anything on it that looks different from usual. And keep an eye on your bank statements to see if there are any withdrawals that you didn’t make.

Mel writes about atms among other finance related topics.

Article Source:http://www.articlesbase.com/investing-articles/atms-are-they-fraud-friendly-1496877.html