[ISN] Bluetooth at heart of gas station credit-card scam

http://www.itworldcanada.com/news/bluetooth-at-heart-of-gas-station-credit-card-scam/141087

By Ellen Messmer 
Network World Canada
13 July 2010

Thieves are stealing credit-card numbers through skimmers they secretly 
installed inside pumps at gas stations in the U.S., using Bluetooth 
wireless to transmit stolen card numbers, says law enforcement 
investigating the incidents.

"We've sent detectives out to every gas station within a mile of (U.S.) 
Interstate (highway) 75," says Lt. Steve Maynard, spokesman for the 
Alachua County Sheriff's Office in Gainesville, Fla., which last 
Thursday was first notified about a suspicious skimming device 
discovered by a maintenance worker at a Shell Station. So far, three 
card-skimming devices hidden in gas pumps at three stations have been 
discovered by the Alachua County Sheriff's Office, and the U.S. Secret 
Service has been notified as part of the gas-pump card-skimming 
investigation.

The Secret Service may be best known as the U.S. president's bodyguard, 
but it is also responsible for investigating fraud and computer crime.

The Alachua County Sheriff's Office, along with other local police 
departments, are trying to inspect as many gas stations in the area as 
possible, especially focusing on those along I-75. But law enforcement 
is encouraging gas station operators to look for signs of the skimmers 
at their pumps and contact them if they think they've found something. 
The Secret Service has indicated there's a crime wave throughout the 
Southeast involving the gas-station pump card skimmers, and it may be 
traced back to a single gang that may be working out of Miami, Maynard 
says.

[...]



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