Police have swooped on a gang of scammers thought to be behind a sophisticated eftpos card skimming operation.
Four people are expected to face court today in connection with the latest scam targeting New Zealanders' bank cards - this time hijacking eftpos machines in stores.
At least 60 customers in two different banks had thousands of dollars withdrawn from an ATM in Canada at the weekend.
It is separate from a scam that affected ATMs throughout Auckland in February and March, where more than a million dollars was taken by fraudsters who withdrew money in cities around the world. In those cases, a "skimming" device was fitted over the slot where the card is inserted into the ATM so they could collect information from the card's magnetic strip while a small camera fitted above the keypad recorded the number being entered.
However, The New Zealand Herald understands latest cases have targeted eftpos terminals inside stores and not ATMs -possibly by stealing and replacing them with machines with devices fitted to them or by tampering with them in store.
It is understood four people were arrested by police in Auckland on Friday evening and would appear in court today.
About 30 customers from BNZ and Westpac were affected at the weekend. Eftpos, credit cards and debit cards had all been used, the banks said.
People affected have had their bank accounts frozen and would have to have new cards issued.
They will be reimbursed for any money that has been taken.
Bill Farmer, chief executive of credit card security business Mako Networks, said much of the focus on card fraud was usually to do with ATMs, but criminals regularly "harvested" information from other locations.
"They could have people that are working in the individual businesses, particularly the hospitality trade,and they basically take the credit card or debit card and get the information off it through a separate reader." A senior lecturer in banking at Massey University, Claire Matthews, said people should not be worried about using their cards despite the recent skimming scams and eftpos machine tampering.
"If the worst does happen and your money does go missing, if you haven't disclosed your pin to anyone and used reasonable precaution the bank will replace it - it just might be a bit of inconvenience while your accounts frozen and while you're waiting for a new card." It was much harder to compromise eftpos terminals because someone was normally with them at all times, meaning they were mostly "inside jobs", she said.
