Fast Money Loans

Credit card skimming is causing an international problem which accounts for losses of over one billion dollars a year. In the United States this type of credit card scam is now being used although it is more commonly implimented in Latin America, Asia and Europe.

It can be easy to run a credit card scam, such as this, when you give your credit card to a store employee in order to make a purchase. When the store employee swipes your card for the purchase, it could also be swiped across a small machine in their hand called a skimmer which stores the information on your card into its own system for the store employee to use to steal from you. The information in this skimmer is used by crooks to produce counterfeit cards from the hundreds of debit and credit cards it has information on.

There are skimming rings working nearly in every corner of the world and as soon as your information is put into the skimmer, it is then downloaded into a computer and is ready to be emailed to anyone worldwide. About ten years ago it was not as easy to accomplish this fraud as it can be today, because the skimmers were large, bulky machines which had to be hidden under the counter in the store.

Some of the technological advances of the past few years has made it a possibility for these skimming machines to be hand-held and thus, invisible to the unsuspecting customer. These skimmers are easy to buy; they can be purchased over the internet at around three hundred dollars, but the machine needed to make counterfeit credit cards is a much larger investment; costing in a neighborhood from five thousand to ten thousand dollars.

Another form of skimming is done by placing a skimmer bug directly into the credit card terminals and then retrieving it later with credit card information on it. The older terminals are the only ones which can be violated in this way, and the onset of new credit card terminals has alleviated much of this bugging.

As soon as the credit card skimmers have confiscated all of the information they need from your card, they will begin to make purchases of their choice with your credit card number. Over half of credit card fraud is committed over the internet, with shopping by this method becoming more and more popular, card fraud on the internet has also increased. The internet is also used by the thieves to make certain that the card’s information is valid through the purchase of many low ticket items to be assured that the card is active.

The cardholder is one victim of this crime and is responsible for up to fifty dollars of the total amount charged on his card, however, the major victim in all of this is the merchant whose employee did the skimming. The merchant is responsible for payment of the fees for the investigation of the fraud which has taken place and he also is held one hundred percent responsible for the skimming activity and risks the loss of the merchandise. The money used by the credit card companies to offset the cost of investigating charge-back claims by their customers, comes from the investigation fees paid by consumers using credit and businesses.

Those who do this skimming scam operation know that a purchase of at least 00 must be made before a criminal investigation can begin.

Visit JSNet.org for more information on the best credit cards available and also great deals on prepaid credit cards. JSNet.org also have more of Alisdair Cosgrove’s great articles including ‘Credit Card Grace Periods‘, visit today to read more of these great credit card articles!

Technorati Tags: balance transfer credit cards, best credit cards, credit cards, student credit cards