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The article does not state that there was any sort of profit sharing involved. People involved in online fraud rarely collaborate with each other. You never kn

The article does not state that there was any sort of profit sharing involved. People involved in online fraud rarely collaborate with each other. You never know who's on the other end and your anonymity is your biggest strength. It's more of a marketplace where you buy cards, skimmers, or accounts from vendors and then go out and use them on your own. Some guy probably sold these cards (or just the data to encode them) at a hefty price with the disclaimer that they had to be used on a certain date and time at any ATM.

cellis 18y ago
I don't think he sold them with a time limit. For a simple reason: the cards had to be refreshed after they had hit their withdrawal limit. This, coupled with the fact that they all happened at the same time, strongly points to realtime complicity on both sides of the transaction, anonymous or not. What compels this guy to refresh these cards? I mean from a game theory point of view it doesn't benefit him at all...assuming both parties are indeed anon.
- tsetse-fly 18y ago
  Maybe he sold the cards as being unlimited money for 30 minutes. It's probably not even difficult to refresh the cards. He was already in their system, he had the account numbers, it could have been scripted. This was a one-shot deal -- the accounts and his hole into WorldPay were probably cut-off the next day. There's little reason for him not hype these cards, sell them for a good price and keep them working. The benefit to him is his increased reputation. You can't survive in these circles unless people vouch for you. That's why, when you read articles about darkmarket, they talk about reviewers who inspect products from vendors. This guy just sold products that netted $9,000,000. Everyone is going to want to buy from him now. Don't think that there's nothing in it for the vendor. ATM skimmers sell for $7,000. If he pulls this off again, people may just buy the cards from him for $10,000 each for a 700% return. That's not too shabby for sitting on your ass and not taking the risk of being on the streets. I just don't believe that this was structured like a traditional gang. This level of organization in online fraud is completely unprecedented. There were more than 6 cities hit in numerous countries, I don't see them recruiting that many random people to participate and having profit sharing since gangs are tight-knit.
  - tsetse-fly 18y ago
    Edit: they hit at least 49 different cities according to the article.

cellis 18y ago

I don't think he sold them with a time limit. For a simple reason: the cards had to be refreshed after they had hit their withdrawal limit. This, coupled with the fact that they all happened at the same time, strongly points to realtime complicity on both sides of the transaction, anonymous or not. What compels this guy to refresh these cards? I mean from a game theory point of view it doesn't benefit him at all...assuming both parties are indeed anon.

tsetse-fly 18y ago
Maybe he sold the cards as being unlimited money for 30 minutes. It's probably not even difficult to refresh the cards. He was already in their system, he had the account numbers, it could have been scripted. This was a one-shot deal -- the accounts and his hole into WorldPay were probably cut-off the next day. There's little reason for him not hype these cards, sell them for a good price and keep them working. The benefit to him is his increased reputation. You can't survive in these circles unless people vouch for you. That's why, when you read articles about darkmarket, they talk about reviewers who inspect products from vendors. This guy just sold products that netted $9,000,000. Everyone is going to want to buy from him now. Don't think that there's nothing in it for the vendor. ATM skimmers sell for $7,000. If he pulls this off again, people may just buy the cards from him for $10,000 each for a 700% return. That's not too shabby for sitting on your ass and not taking the risk of being on the streets. I just don't believe that this was structured like a traditional gang. This level of organization in online fraud is completely unprecedented. There were more than 6 cities hit in numerous countries, I don't see them recruiting that many random people to participate and having profit sharing since gangs are tight-knit.
- tsetse-fly 18y ago
  Edit: they hit at least 49 different cities according to the article.