How the hi-tech card scam worked

ACCORDING to Una Dillon of the Irish Payment Services Organisation, the criminals took terminals that were already in the shop and replaced them with similar ones.

The new terminal included extra equipment including a memory chip and a mobile phone SIM card that can transmit the information for the criminals.

“Subsequently, when cards go through the compromised terminal, they are able to capture that card information and pin numbers,” said Ms Dillon. “They then made fake cards with the old magnetic strip type, because they can’t actually copy the chip.”

It is understood the retailers targeted had software on their systems which monitors activity and that alerted them to what was going on.

The reason the banks have restricted the use of cards abroad is because the chip and pin technology is not in use in a number of other countries.

Shop owners have been warned that there could be more of the affected systems throughout the country. One piece of advice is to find out how much the machine should weigh from its manufacturer and measure its weight now.

The scam which hit shops in Ireland over the weekend has been used in other countries.

In 2006, two men attached a cloning machine to the tills of a BP petrol station in Bristol, England.

Over a 20-day period it recorded 199 credit card details and £108,000 (€137,000) was stolen when the card details were used in ATM machines in Egypt, Tunisia and Kenya.