London-based East European Gang Used Barclays Bank Cards In £300,000 French Cash Point Scam

[interestrateripoff]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/...point-scam.html

Dozens of London-based Slovakians have been arrested in northern France after using Barclays bank cards to fraudulently withdraw more than £300,000 in cash.

The astonishing scam saw up to 50 of the eastern Europeans arrive in Calais early last Friday morning before emptying cash points across the region.

Armed police made 34 arrests, but not before many had fled with bags of money which remain unaccounted for.

'It's one of the most bizarre crimes we've ever dealt with,' said a detective working for the Judicial Police in the city of Lille.

'These men and women had travelled across to Calais by ferry with the express intention of emptying French cash machines using Barclays bank cards issued in London.

'More than €130,000 (£114,000) was taken from the centre of Dunkirk alone in the early hours of Friday morning.'

The mass withdrawals triggered alarm bells at a specialist financial monitoring unit in Paris, leading to an armed response unit being activated.

At 9.30am on Friday six men were arrested in Calais with more than £22,000 worth of newly-withdrawn euros in their pockets.

Much more had been taken in earlier raids, including at least £135,000 worth of euros from machines in Dunkirk, and £27,000 in Béthune.

All of those arrested were carrying scores of Barclays bank cards, many of which are believed to have been handed over willingly by members of London's large Slovakian community.

Like all bank cards, they were able to be used in numerous machines, and not just ones run by Barclays.

'Whoever was responsible for this scam worked out how to use the Barclays card abroad without any credit limit, and had got lots of Slovakians based in Britain interested,' said the source.

Investigators working for France’s specialist technical fraud unit, the OCLCTIC admitted they were initially ‘baffled’ as to how the Slovakians had pulled the scam off.

Although some of the cards may have been stolen, they believe the majority had been handed over with PIN numbers by Slovakians nationals in Britain who were ‘on a promise’ of receiving lots of free money.

‘The main point is that there was no cash limit on withdrawals,’ said an OCLCTIC source.

‘Bank customers using cards in their own country can expect a withdrawal limit of around €200 a day, but that was not the case here. Unlimited money could be withdrawn from an account, even if there was technically hardly anything in it.’

Slovakian gangsters have traditionally been at the forefront of ATM scam technology, said the source.

I say get these people in charge of the bailout, they clearly know how to get hold of money and quickly.

So AIG crashed because of London

Lehmans crashed because of London

And this fraud originated out of London.

I wish I could see a connection here but I can't.

[rw42]

Be very surprised if there wasn't inside help there.. sounds like a big flaw in barclay's IT systems :/

[D.C.]

Be very surprised if there wasn't inside help there.. sounds like a big flaw in barclay's IT systems :/

There was a program on a few months back about a student who did a similar thing to Natwest using a hole in their cashback security.

Ran up £40,000 overdraft on the card because natwest didn't bother to check available funds when a cash back transaction was processed.

[M21er]

There was a program on a few months back about a student who did a similar thing to Natwest using a hole in their cashback security.

Ran up £40,000 overdraft on the card because natwest didn't bother to check available funds when a cash back transaction was processed.

Student runs up £60k of debt - £15k using cashback from local Spar

During this period Mr Barnes made hundreds of cashback withdrawals at the same Spar store where it would appear he knew transactions under a certain amount would be accepted by the retailer without requiring further authorisa-tion. It is important to point out that today, this could not happen due to the introduction of chip & pin and other enhancements that require transactions to be authorised

Edited September 14, 2009 by M21er

[D.C.]

Student runs up £60k of debt - £15k using cashback from local Spar

During this period Mr Barnes made hundreds of cashback withdrawals at the same Spar store where it would appear he knew transactions under a certain amount would be accepted by the retailer without requiring further authorisa-tion. It is important to point out that today, this could not happen due to the introduction of chip & pin and other enhancements that require transactions to be authorised

Ta. That is the fella.