Security Expert Comments on 100 thieves in Japan take $13M in 3 hours

The Guardian is reporting:  Members of an international crime syndicate are suspected of stealing more than 1.4bn yen (US$12.7m) from cash machines in Japan in the space of less than three hours, in an audacious heist that involved thousands of coordinated withdrawals.  Police believe that as many as 100 people, none of whom have been apprehended, worked together using forged credit cards containing account details illegally obtained from a bank in South Africa. John Gunn, VP of Communications, VASCO Data Security commented on this news below.

John Gunn, VP of Communications, VASCO Data Security:

ATM fraud remains a leading cause of losses for banks, and this will likely increase in the U.S. as the shift to EMV cards at retail drives fraud to other channels such as the ATM. We are already seeing large banks moving to integrate ATM security measures into their mobile banking app. It is easy for fraudsters to buy stolen cards to make unauthorized withdrawals, but it’s nearly impossible to commit theft if they must also have the intended-victim’s mobile phone physically at the ATM machine at the same time. You can expect to see banks leverage customers’ mobile phones to reduce fraud across all channels in the future.