Two credit unions in Wisconsin have been swept into a growing skimming epidemic that some local police say is unprecedented.
On Tuesday, Educators Credit Union disclosed that thieves had embedded skimmers at five of its ATMs in Racine, Milwaukee and Kenosha, Wisc. The skimmers were only in place for several hours on Sept. 6 and Sept. 12, according to the credit union. It said it has analyzed accounts and contacted members whose debit cards were used at those machines.
Educators CU, headquartered in Mount Pleasant, Wisc., has $1.6 billion in assets and 133,000 members.
In Madison, Wis., police crime analysts said in an incident report on Tuesday that they've documented a total of eight skimming devices on ATMs in Madison, Fitchburg and Monona, Wisc. since June 15 (a card reading device, courtesy of the City of Madison Police Department, is pictured above). Branches of UW Credit Union ($2 billion in assets; 204,000 members), as well as BMO Harris Bank and Associated Bank were affected, and the losses are estimated at several hundred thousand dollars, the report said.
Madison Police Department Crime Analyst Brayton Grinnell told CU Times that a BMO Harris fraud investigator has examined some of the recovered skimmer components, and it appears the criminals are purchasing manufacturer ATM parts and then altering them, he said.
"Evidently, these criminals are able to buy legitimate ATM parts from manufacturers," Madison Police Public Information Officer Joel DeSpain said in an interview. "So it seems to me there should be something that should prevent them from buying stuff that looks like a real card reader."
Grinnell said the affected ATMs in his area are primarily NCR models 6638 and 6632.
The crimes may be the actions of a larger group, because the same type of skimming equipment has been recovered in the Minneapolis, Madison and Milwaukee areas, he added.
"This is fairly new to Madison," he said. "I've been here for seven and a half years, and we really haven't seen any skimming devices in that amount of time."
DeSpain added, "We can warn people and we can get pictures out. If we got lucky, maybe we'd catch these guys in the act, but they're in and out fast."
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