Gang Used 3D Printers To Make ATM Skimmers

An anonymous reader sends this excerpt from a post by security researcher Brian Krebs: "An ATM skimmer gang stole more than $400,000 using skimming devices built with the help of high-tech 3D printers, federal prosecutors say. ... Apparently, word is spreading in the cybercrime underworld that 3D printers produce flawless skimmer devices with exacting precision. Last year, i-materialize blogged about receiving a client's order for building a card skimmer. In June, a federal court indicted four men from South Texas whom authorities say had reinvested the profits from skimming scams to purchase a 3D printer."

Very broken system

[syousef]

When a 3d printer can make a decent skimming device (or disguise one) you can't help but think the system is truly broken. Computer security has progressed in leaps and bounds - it isn't perfect and it certainly isn't idiot proof. But banks are still using hand written signatures and easily faked devices while all but ignoring the risk. Heck they're introducing pinless low value transactions at shopping centers in Australia. I'm ANNOYED that my card can be used without either a signature or a pin number verification being used. It means there's significant risk that me or my wife lose a credit card and don't immediately discover it, we'll be up for a very large sum of money. And even if we're not, we won't have access to the money while the issue is resolved.

It's not sustainable. The banks need to be held more accountable.

How long till they can print money?

[Sasayaki]

I've always wondered what the economics of the world of cheap, prolific, effective 3D printers is like. If anyone can create basically any material good, what's the economics of that place like?

Star Trek had replicators, which could basically make anything, even food or water (except for a few things which were a de-facto currency). They were basically communists, which doesn't work with people being people but might work if anyone could create whatever they wanted.

But what about things that can't be replicated/printed? Like electricity, or land for housing, or water/food? Trek says that water and food are replicable, but with our current 3D printers obviously we can't make that just yet unless you can eat plastic.

What's the economy of the western world going to look like if the only thing we need is material for 3D printers, power, land, food and water? Will provision of the un-replicable become the job of the state?

Goin' Digital!

[Anachragnome]

I was having a discussion with my daughter (an artist) the other day about protecting her work, and much of what we discussed applies to this technology--when you get right down to it, the moment you convert any product into a digital format, and expose it to the internet in any way, you lose a great deal of control of that creation, if not all.

This technology is about to do that to physical objects, by proxy--the dimensions are what are actually being digitized. The end result will be the same though--freely available physical products. The only catch is that the user must provide the physical medium...kind of like someone providing a blank CD in order to utilize an MP3 file. I predict that, one day, the king of "most downloaded" torrents will be a 3D printer file for a bong.

This is the same genie that the recording/electronics industries let out of its bottle about 28 years ago. He appears to be having much adventure and does not wish to return to his bottle. Ever.

Welcome to everyone else's life

[Sycraft-fu]

I don't get to retire from work after doing a few things particularly well. If I did, well I'd probably be retired. There's been a few projects that I've done a really great job getting done despite various things standing in the way and so on. However they don't go and shower millions of dollars on me and say "Go retire at 30!" No, I get paid to show up to work each day and I have to keep showing up, keep doing my job, if I want to keep getting paid.

Same deal with people who produce physical goods to sell. If you build a house and sell it, you get whatever price you sold it for and that's it. You don't get further income from that house. When the owner resells it, you don't get a cut, if the value increases, they don't owe you further money. If you want to make more money, you have to continue to make more houses and sell them.

So it makes sense to, as the constitution says " (secure) for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." You can't expect them to work for free, they need to be able to make money on their efforts. The "Information should be completely free," crowd is living in a fantasy world. However they shouldn't be allowed to just ride on one thing forever. Like anyone else, they should have to keep working if they want to keep making money.

Remember that our society relies on people continuing to work. If everyone worked only a little and then retired, well we'd be real fucked. We need things to keep getting done. That's why you need to work for a long time before you retire. There is no reason that creative types should be the one exception to the rule.

Re:Goin' Digital!

[Anonymous Coward]

A typical engineer's attitude towards art. Let me guess - you don't make money by writing the book, you get it by doing readings or something right? You don't make money by painting the painting, but by charging for t-shirts of the painting. You know what bud, there is absolutely nothing in this world that you can't do that can't be done more cheaply by a team somewhere in Eastern Europe, Asia or India. No skill you have, no knowledge you hold, no talent (because you certainly don't believe that talent is worth rewarding given your attitude towards artists) that can't be replicated by a few hundred thousand less well compensated people around the globe. Think about this in 20 years when you attacked the foundation of the artists income. There will be poetic justice (not that you believe in the merits of poetry or literature because that doesn't fit nicely into your worker drone paradigm). Because your job is on pretty fucking shaky ground as well - because if a company can get the same level of drivel (and your post indicates that your intellectual skills aren't anything exceptional) out of someone much cheaper - they'll turf you like a used tampon.