Shoppers Being Ripped off By High Tech Scanners..Today.Com:

[Stuart G]

http://www.today.com/money/tiny-high-tech-cash-register-skimmers-ripping-credit-card-numbers-8C11396234

picture at link...unable to copy
One of the six skimmers found and removed from cash registers at the Nordstrom store in Aventura, Fla. According to a police report on the incident, "no one would have detected it unless there was a problem with the register."
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Crooks who steal credit and debit card numbers have found a devious new way to snag this information. They’re using a small and relatively cheap piece of off-the-shelf technology to compromise computerized store cash registers.


We know about this because a band of brazen thieves was caught on security cameras installing these high-tech skimmers on cash registers at the Nordstrom store in Aventura, Fla., two weeks ago.

The skimmers are built into standard Ps2 cable connectors that plug into the back of a computer where customers can’t see them. They’re only about an inch long — and look so innocuous that even if employees saw them they might not suspect anything.

“It’s a little piece of plastic, usually purple, that fits into the port where your keyboard connects to your computer,” explained security analyst Brian Krebs, who first reported this story on his KrebsOnSecurity blog. “It intercepts any data that is sent on that communication channel, whether it’s keystrokes or somebody swiping a card through a terminal.”