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In new ATM association, competition takes a back seat to crimefighting

The ATM Security Association for Enhanced Technology asks members to join a common cause against an underworld of uncommonly determined ATM fraudsters and cyberthieves.

December 18, 2014 by Suzanne Cluckey — Owner, Suzanne Cluckey Communications

"The enemy of my enemy is my friend." So the saying goes, and it apparently applies even if the enemy of your enemy happens also to be your competitor.

ATM vendors Wincor Nixdorf and Diebold Inc. put competition aside in July and teamed up to combat their common enemy — common criminals — with the creation of an industry-wide organization they envision as a united front in the escalating battle against cyberthieves and fraudsters. Since July, the partners have formally named the new organization and legally registered it in the Netherlands.

The founders view the new organization as a central point for two activities — gathering data about ATM fraud and sharing information about methods and procedures to thwart criminal exploits as they become known.

Even as the ATM Security Association for Enhanced Technology was being formalized, industry stakeholders from the manufacturing and banking sectors were making known their interest in aligning with the group, according to Diebold VP of Product Management and Marketing Joerg Engelhardt and Wincor Nixdorf VP of Banking Uwe Krause.

The two VPs were closely involved with the founding of the new association, which headlined a session at October's ATM Security 2014 conference in London — and found a responsive audience, they said in an interview with ATM Marketplace.

"It was a very lively, very interesting discussion," Engelhardt said. "And along the lines of this discussion, we are also increasing the list of interested parties that want to join the association in 2015."

They'll have that opportunity when the ATM Security Association website debuts within days. "We should have the front end of website up and running, and from there everyone who is interested is also able to access the membership page and they are able to apply officially."

Annual membership fees for the organization will vary based on the member category, but will be "very much in line with the fees from other associations," Engelhardt said.

"It depends strongly on whether it is a voting membership or just a participation membership; there are differences in the membership categories they can apply for." Membership specifics will be described in detail on the website, he said.

Physical meetings will take place three to four times a year, with additional side meetings by video- or teleconference as needed Krause said. An inaugural meeting in Q1 2015 will serve as the platform to set priorities, projects and work streams, and to establish smaller working groups.

Obviously, skimming and cyberhacking will be among the priorities, but it will be largely up to members to develop the list, Krause said.

"It's not structured that we want to start with ... protection against skimming. We have to first request [input] from the members of the association. One target point at the moment is skimming, which is on the [agenda], but it's also on the list to discuss software solutions which can protect whole environment of the customer against attack."

Engelhardt expects members will want to address two issues: "One is we want to speed up the information exchange for incidents that are happening, and make sure that in the best way we are protecting our customer and the consumer.

"And the secondary part that we always talk about is what priorities can we see for a potential standardization approach."

The association also will involve government authorities such as Europol and the FBI at some point, however, for the time being, contact will be on a discussion, and not a participation, basis.

Initially, Engelhardt said, the ATM Security Association's focus will be on getting concrete input from financial institutions and "increasing visibility and transparency between the ATM manufacturers on what really, on an incident by incident basis, is happening so that we can proactively in align work on resolutions that will help the industry to protect our customers and consumers on the other side."

Krause said that during the ATM Security conference he and Engelhardt had been asked the obvious question about whether ATM Security Association members can truly forget about their competitive interests in order to reach agreed standards and strategies for the industry.

"I think Joerg and myself, we were able to explain that security is an industry issue and not an issue for Diebold or NCR or Wincor or any others," Krause said. "It's affecting the industry. Also the financial institutes have to work together because these are attacks against cash — it's an industry issue."

photo courtesy fauxto_digit | flickr

About Suzanne Cluckey

Suzanne’s editorial career has spanned three decades and encompassed all B2B and B2C communications formats. Her award-winning work has appeared in trade and consumer media in the United States and internationally.

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