Recently, I became victim of what is called as 'Skimming'[1] or
'Cloning'[2] of Debit/Credit Cards. Hence this is the mail regarding
safe guarding yourself from such activities.
I blocked my card immediately after seeing SMS of Card transaction, but to get the money, I had to file a FIR in nearest police station. To retrieve my money from the bank, it is mandatory for them to have a FIR number. It is required for them to carry further investigation too.
Meantime the event of FIR filing was not an easy job. Good thing here for me was Police was bit friendly (Kumaraswamy layout Police Station), but they were not up-to-date with how to handle case like this. Initially they said it is a cyber crime case, and I have to visit CID office (who handle cyber crime investigations too). I went there and CID told they won't take direct complaint of such cases, but if I give the copy of the FIR which is registered in nearest police station they carry out the investigation of card transaction etc. They acknowledged that this particular case falls under their category, but couldn't help me without FIR. I had to go back to station and convince police to help me file the FIR. This whole event took around 3 days, as ASIs were not ready to take the case and referred to SI, and SIs referred to Inspector, and Inspector was on Rounds whenever I went to Station. Finally, today (after 4 days of event taking place), I could meet the inspector and he was helpful, listened to whole case, and asked me to file a FIR.
So of all these experience, my advise to all of you is that, right away, make sure that your card is EMV Card [3], or at least you be sure that get prompted for PIN while you give out your Debit Card when you swipe it. Also avoid giving out cards in places which look suspicious (ie, those who doesn't swipe the card in front of you).
It is our responsibility that our hard earned money is spent by us, than some other fraud enjoying it without lot of effort.
Ref:
[1] - http://www.cyberpolicebangalore.nic.in/atm_frauds.html (search for skimming)
[2] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_card_fraud#Skimming
[3] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EMV
Update (on Dec 15th, 2012): I got all the amount (~70k INR) refunded from the bank, which inturn got it refunded from merchants because they didn't had any ID proof for transaction, which is not fine as per RBI guidelines (any transaction above 5k, the merchants should ask for photo id).
I blocked my card immediately after seeing SMS of Card transaction, but to get the money, I had to file a FIR in nearest police station. To retrieve my money from the bank, it is mandatory for them to have a FIR number. It is required for them to carry further investigation too.
Meantime the event of FIR filing was not an easy job. Good thing here for me was Police was bit friendly (Kumaraswamy layout Police Station), but they were not up-to-date with how to handle case like this. Initially they said it is a cyber crime case, and I have to visit CID office (who handle cyber crime investigations too). I went there and CID told they won't take direct complaint of such cases, but if I give the copy of the FIR which is registered in nearest police station they carry out the investigation of card transaction etc. They acknowledged that this particular case falls under their category, but couldn't help me without FIR. I had to go back to station and convince police to help me file the FIR. This whole event took around 3 days, as ASIs were not ready to take the case and referred to SI, and SIs referred to Inspector, and Inspector was on Rounds whenever I went to Station. Finally, today (after 4 days of event taking place), I could meet the inspector and he was helpful, listened to whole case, and asked me to file a FIR.
So of all these experience, my advise to all of you is that, right away, make sure that your card is EMV Card [3], or at least you be sure that get prompted for PIN while you give out your Debit Card when you swipe it. Also avoid giving out cards in places which look suspicious (ie, those who doesn't swipe the card in front of you).
It is our responsibility that our hard earned money is spent by us, than some other fraud enjoying it without lot of effort.
Ref:
[1] - http://www.cyberpolicebangalore.nic.in/atm_frauds.html (search for skimming)
[2] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_card_fraud#Skimming
[3] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EMV
Update (on Dec 15th, 2012): I got all the amount (~70k INR) refunded from the bank, which inturn got it refunded from merchants because they didn't had any ID proof for transaction, which is not fine as per RBI guidelines (any transaction above 5k, the merchants should ask for photo id).
