Alien rigging ATM nabbed by Angeles City police

ATM. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

ANGELES CITY, Philippines—Police arrested an Italian man who was caught installing a card-skimming device in an automated teller machine (ATM) in a bank in Barangay (village) Balibago here on Friday night.

Police said Roberto de Cecco, 62, an Italian tourist staying at La Belle Helene Townhouse in Barangay Malabanias, was confronted by security guards of the Philippine Savings Bank Balibago branch at 8 p.m. after they saw him installing a skimming device in the ATM.

Police said two Caucasian men who were with De Cecco fled in a sport utility vehicle.

Police described the device as an “improvised [magnetic strip] reader and an improvised metal cover for a closed-circuit television camera connected to a chip with a 16-gigabyte memory card and cell phone battery.”

The device would copy vital information on a depositor from the magnetic strip on their ATM card.

Bank guards told police that De Cecco arrived in a black Hyundai Tucson with two other men who sped off after the Italian was held.

Policemen and Barangay Malabanias officials then went to the La Belle townhouse where they just missed the two other suspects who had left with some of their belongings.

Photocopies of the suspects’ passports identified them as Gyorgy Sandor Varro and Romana Marian Grama, both of Romania.

A townhouse guard said Varro and Grama arrived at 8:30 p.m., fetched two female foreigners from the unit they were renting and left.

Police found another ATM skimming device in the townhouse.

De Cecco was charged with violation of Republic Act No. 8484, or the Access Devices Regulation Act of 1998.

Card-skimming devices have been found in ATMs here in recent months.

On Dec. 24, a card-skimming machine and a portable camera were discovered in a Banco de Oro ATM machine on Sto. Rosario Street in Barangay Sto. Domingo.

Police also reported the discovery of a card-skimming device in a Metrobank ATM in a hotel in the Malabanias tourist district last year.—Jun Malig