From: pw@Panix.Com (Paul Wallich)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Good Opportunity For Fraud
Date: 21 Jan 93 20:08:37 GMT
Organization: Trivializers R Us
X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 13, Issue 37, Message 12 of 15

In <telecom13.33.12@eecs.nwu.edu> patlee@Panix.Com (Patrick Lee)
writes:

> eo@cbnewsb.cb.att.com (Ed Oliveri) wrote:

>> Are you sure this was Citibank?  Every Citibank ATM I've seen
>> CANNOT eat a card since the card is dipped into the card
>> reader, never leaving the user's fingers.

> Our Moderator Noted:

>> The Citibank ATM's in Chicago eat the card for a minute and
>> spit it out when finished with it.

> I guess Chicago's Citibank has older ATM machines than we have here in
> New York City.  I haven't seen any Citibank ATM machine which eats the
> card for the past few years.  Just dip the card in and take it out and
> proceed with answering which of the five languages to use.

Actually it's the other way around. NYC Citibank ATM's are older than
ATM's anywhere else becaue citi (whatever else their many myriad
faults) had (one of) the first atm network(s). Back in the dim times,
some marketing schlub discovered that people were afraid to hand their
life savings (or card representing same) to a machine that would
probably eat it. Citi harped on the safety of their system even though
it required developing card-reader technology that wouldn't work with
anybody else's cards.

The amusing thing is that (at least up through a couple years ago)
Citibank in NYC and Citibank in the rest of the country were two
different entities, so that a card that worked at one place wouldn't
work in the other, e.g. my NYC card wouldn't work in Berkeley. Even
more fun, when the various cash-card networks got going (CIRRUS, NYCE
&c), a situation developed where an out-of-state Citicard would work
anywhere in New York _except_ at Citibank itself. Let's hear it for
good network design.


paul


[Moderator's Note: Speaking of good opportunities for fraud, on my way
home tonight, I passed a sidewalk ATM downtown which was beeping as I
went past. I went to look at it, and the message on the screen said
'Do you need more time?  yes ---->
                         no  ---->

Mercy me, I said to myself, what have we here?  A receipt sticking out
of the little slot said *someone* had taken $50 and still had a
balance of $32,000 in their account ... simple-minded fool that I am,
I pressed the 'no' (I do not need more time) button, and of course a
First National Banking Card (combination ATM and debit card here)
popped out of the slot ... ooops! Mercy me, I said to myself, what did
I do that for! :) Once the card had ejected, it was pointless to stand
there putting it back in and trying to hack a passcode, particularly
with that camera staring out at me snapping my picture.  I took the
card to the bank across the street, put it in a night deposit envelope
with a note saying 'found loose by ATM, please return to owner' and
dropped it in the slot. Riding home on the subway, I was able to feel
morally superior and Socially Responsible about the whole incident
which was a better way to feel than feeling like a stupid klutz. :)  PAT]