Identity Theft via Credit Cards

As more merchants, especially restaurants, have gone to credit and debit card usage, theives have become more adept at profiting from the experience. Two major methods exist for crooks to swipe identities from restaurant credit card usage. The least high-tech methodf is when theives simply copy information while posing as legitimate waiters or waitresses. This can be done simply using a fifty dollar swiper purchased on the internet. The information is then reproduced or sold tio the highest bidder and usually winds up for sale on the internet.

The second method is more sophisticated and far more deadly. Hackers, usually from Eastern European countries where the U.S. has no jurisdiction, break into a restaurant's P.O.S. system and steal all the information from their hard drive. They often sit for months, and even post a marking on the site to prevent other theives from entering the sight. Once discovered, they simply close out on that site and continue with others. This information, your credit card numbers, ID numbers, etc. is then transferred (machinery sold on internet for about five hundred dollars) to a duplicate card and sold on the internet. You can find numerous sites from Eastern European countries where purchases can be made, often in bulk at tremendous discount rates.

Currently, there are only two methods of beating them at their illicit game. One is to pay cash, and the other is for the restaurant to use pay at the table technology which is not tied in to their pos systems. Although the latter method is prevalent in Europe and Canada, most American restaurants are loathe to attempt change, especially when they have spent thousands updating their current P O S systems top handle inventory, tips, ordering and numerous other activities above and beyond mere credit card processing. It appears that many of them will have to be burned before they wake up to the fastest growing white collar crime in America. One thing is certain, when Visa and MasterCard come in and cancell all cards used on the site for the last eighteen months and charge the restaurant thirty five dollars apiece to re-issue them, along with fines, etc. they then get the message, if they can still stay in business.