ODESSA, Texas — The city of Odessa has recently experienced a "rash" of card skimmers being found across the city, according to the Odessa Police Department.
Card skimmers are devices that read the magnetic stripe on a card and store the information once it is swept. They are often partnered with hidden cameras that capture the numbers that are entered into keypads.
"What they do is they'll access your personal information, your credit card information and then they'll make large purchases," said Steve LeSueur, the department's public information officer.
The department wasn't able to provide the number of skimmers that have been reported so far this year, but OPD said they're being found at grocery stores, ATM's and lately, at convenience stores.
These skimmer devices can be placed over top of a real card reader. In other occasions, skimmers can be false pin pads such as the one Sergio Bennett of Odessa said he found when he was headed to work.
"I was pressing the buttons a lot, and whenever I was pressing it really hard, (the pin pad) felt like it was sticky," Bennett said. "Once I felt that, I looked at it closely and in the upper right corner you could see a gap, so I pulled it out."
According to OPD, some of these skimmers can be recognized within an hour or two. Sometimes, it can take several days.
"So with that being said, unfortunately there can be a lot of victims. However, we do investigate them," LeSueur said.
LeSueur also said the best way for businesses to deter this crime is by installing excellent cameras.
Not only is it important to immediately report a skimmer device, but it's also important to make a credit card abuse report with police if a person's information is stolen.
"We've had this happen several times in the past few years," LeSueur said. "Sometimes they're local, sometimes they're not. Sometimes it's getting to the state level or even higher. But in this case, we have recently had several incidents."
Skimmer devices are becoming more sophisticated, making them hard to tell apart from a real card reader/pin pad.
"A lot of the times you might see a little device hanging and that could be a pinhole camera," LeSueur said. "Sometimes [skimmers] can be pulled out."
According to OPD, the best practice to avoid these skimmers is by inserting the zip code instead of the card PIN when given the option. OPD also said to be cognizant of the security tape seal at the pump to make sure it has not been tampered with.