They obtained a patent four years ago. The hope is that by modifying existing credit card readers, banks and merchants may be able to routinely detect and reject bogus cards, researchers say. The university has licensed the technology to Mag-Tek, a California company. Working with a major card company that it will not identify, Mag-Tek plans to test the technology in 1999 and hopes to have it on the market by 2000. The advantage of the Washington University product, Morley notes, is that it works with cards already in circulation.
Merchants simply add a computer chip to existing readers.
With one use, the card's particulars are stored in a database. You don't counterfeit a card so you can go use it at the local Ponderosa. Investigators say there are dozens of ways criminals scheme to get a copy of the magnetic strip on credit cards. This device copies the magnetic strip, setting in motion a counterfeit scheme that will ring up thousands of dollars in false charges on the account within 24 hours. According to Special Agent Keith Slotter, a credit-fraud specialist with the FBI in Connecticut, some victims spend years trying to restore their ravaged credit ratings.