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Credit Cards At Risk from High-Tech Pickpockets?

Posted on December 3, 2010 by Dissent

Oh yeah, those RFID chips are really improving security.

It’s supposed to make paying for things faster and easier – just wave your credit or debit card over a scanner and you’ve paid.

But now some worry that radio frequency identification (RFID) technology is also making it easier for crooks to rip you off.

Security expert Walt Augustinowicz took a stroll along Beale Street in Memphis where, as witnessed by CBS Affiliate WREG, he was able to swipe the credit card information from passers-by.

“If I’m walking through a crowd, and I get near people’s back pocket and their wallet, I just have to get that close to it and there’s my credit card and expiration date on the screen,” Augustinowicz told WREG correspondent Scott Noll.

Using just an off-the-shelf card reader he bought online for less than $100 and a Netbook computer, Augustinowicz explained, he could swipe credit card numbers, expiration dates, and in some cases, even people’s names.

People who thought there was no way their pocket could be picked without laying a hand on them, soon learned they were wrong.

Read more on CBS.

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