News

Thieves stole $13 million in one day using cloned prepaid cards at ATMs in six countries

August 28, 2011

According to TG Daily, a group of criminals got away with stealing $13 million in one day from ATMs in six different countries in May of this year.

Taking advantage of a flaw in the prepaid systems of debit card processing firm Fidelity National Information Services, as many as 7,170 prepaid accounts may have been put at risk.

Security researcher Brian Krebs said that his sources disclosed that the thieves accessed the FIS network and targeted its Sunrise platform’s "open-loop" prepaid debit cards.

The thieves made dummy cards and distributed the cloned cards to their associates in cities in Europe, Russia and Ukraine.

"Sources say the thieves waited until the close of business in the United States on Saturday, March 5 2011, to launch their attack. Working into Sunday evening, conspirators in Greece, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Ukraine and the United Kingdom used the cloned cards to withdraw cash from dozens of ATMs," Krebs said.

According to the article, FIS isn't commenting on the breach.

For more information on this topic, please visit our security research center.