Rent DVD’s from the RedBox? Watch Out for Skimmers
RedBox is like a gumball machine for DVD rentals. It’s one of the newer inventions that allow people to rent a DVD for $1 a night. They’re found inside grocery stores and other retail areas. People who want to rent a movie simply swipe their credit card, make a selection and out comes the DVD. You can also order your DVD online and pick it up at any RedBox location. When you’re done with the movie, you just return it to any RedBox location- not necessarily the one you rented it from.
Recently, RedBox announced the discovery of an illegal credit card skimmer attached to one of their RedBox locations, as well as several other locations that appeared to show attempts of skimming. The skimmer is a unit that a criminal has installed so that when a consumer swipes their credit card, the card details are transmitted not only to the company you are making a purchase from; but also to the criminal who has intercepted the card details. The skimmer on the RedBox found was immediately removed and reported on the RedBox company website so that individuals could check their records and make sure they hadn’t been victimized.
While super convenient, our credit card security is still a little less secure than we’d like for things like vending machine credit card acceptance. If you use RedBox, here are the reported locations of the skimming and attempted skimmings:
- 1101 South Rural Road, Tempe, AZ (device removed before retrieval by perpetrator)
- 1620 El Paseo Road, Las Cruces, NM (evidence of skimming attempt)
- 2330 East Lohman Avenue, Las Cruces, NM (evidence of skimming attempt)
Kevin said,
April 7, 2008 @ 8:31 pm
What is a skimmer? And how can you tell if there is one on the Red Box machine? I use them constantly and I am close to the tempe location
Thomas said,
May 3, 2008 @ 7:42 am
Credit card number theft is everywhere. Imagine what a teenager could do to your credit card when you hand your card at restautant… He/she walked to the backdoor to charge it also there is a good chance he/she would write down acct/expire date…
Just check your credit card activity online EVERYDAY. I did catch one of charge that isn’t mine and notified the company. They cancelled the credit and took care of everything.