Tips for spotting card skimmers

Relebogile Mabotja speaks to Jan Vermeulen, Editor of MyBroadband.

Listen below.

Card skimmers allow criminals to steal the information stored on your bank card.

This information allows them to clone your card and make payments with it.

“Cards have a magnetic strip on the back that contains information about the card like the card number, your name and even the expiry date.”

- Jan Vermeulen, Editor – MyBroadband

Sometimes these tools will also have a camera to try and steal your CVV number (on the back of the card) or your PIN code.

Card skimmers are installed over the ATM pad or swipe machine and are hard to detect.

They can also look like swipe machines where you can tap or insert your card.

“In South Africa, we tap a lot more than we used to… If you tap, it removes the risk of card skimming.”

- Jan Vermeulen, Editor – MyBroadband

Vermeulen recommends researching what these card skimmers look like versus the real deal.

ATM skimmers are normally placed over the keypads and card insert slot, while card skimming swipe machines require your card to go nearly all the way in for it to work.

If you often use ATMs, banks recommend having one particular ATM that you visit.

This will allow you to familiarise yourself with the ATM, so if anything looks out of place you may be able to spot it.

“You can be on your guard, call the bank to confirm if they made the change, or report an issue if the machine has been tampered with.”

- Jan Vermeulen, Editor – MyBroadband

Scroll up to the audio player to listen to the interview.