Many people are willing to spend a few million dong to buy ATM cards bot bearing their names from the black market. Sellers of these ATM cards often say that they have a large number of ATM cards of all banks. Reporter of Tien Phong has entered the market as a customer looking to buy ATM card.
After searching, reporter contacted a person named Hung (born in 1992) holder of Ken Tran facebook account, who said to be a dealer of ATM cards. Hung said he can make ATM cards of any bank. Each ATM card is priced at two -3.5 million dong depending on the demand for using service. To attract customers, Hung offer a SIM card for registering mobile banking service to customer to easily control and make payment online.
After several times contacting online, Hung made an appointment at To Hieu street (Hanoi) and gave the reporter an ATM card of Saigon Commercial Joint Stock Ban (Sacombank) named Tran Kha Ly (male, born in 1990) along with all account information. The ATM card is new and its password has not been changed.
When being asked about the possibility that the holder of the ID information may come to the bank to withdraw money and lock the card, Hung did not hesitate to say that his ATM card is a real registered card, but the ID information was made by him, using the names of people in remote and highland areas. They often do not have money to open a bank card. Customers can choose their favourite name, gender and the year of birth of the account holder. As long as the customer only does not lose the card and forget the password, everything will be fine. Hung said that customer buying a set of three to seven ATM cards will be presented with the fake ID card used to register those cards.
For peace of mind, Hung showed the reporter how to use the ATM card bearing the name of other people. According to Hung, if the user is a male, Hung will directly go to the bank to open the card, if the user is a female, he will ask a woman to do so. It is fine if the photo ID is not the same as the applicant. “The face does not need to be the same, the bank will still make the card. Sometimes I forgot to stamp the ID card but the bank staff did not notice”, said Hung.
When registering the card, Hung will create simplest signature for the user to easily imitate. According to Hung, there is nothing to worry if the user has the ID card and correct signature.
According to finding of the reporter, at the black market, ATM cards are not only made by the way Hung is doing. On some fanpages which sell bank cards, sellers often offer ATM cards at prices ranging from 50,000 100,000 dong per card. Hung explained that, in these cases, sellers often re-purchase from students at 300,000 400,000 dong and resell for 8-10 times higher. However, for this type of transaction, students only sell the cards but not their ID cards or the SIM used to register the cards. The ATM card will become invalid if the account holder locks the card with the bank.
Some sellers even say that they can make counterfeit cards. Just spending over 100,000 dong to buy fake Chinese blank cards and information from hackers, traders have counterfeit cards to sell to people in need. In most cases, the information was stolen from foreign accounts. However, if the account holder finds abnormal signs, he will report to the police and lock the account. At that time, buyers will lose money.
Hung said that he has been doing this for two to three years. He mainly provides cards for online betting parties, football betting websites, and casinos, etc. Customers often have high demand for making transactions and thus often get a set of seven bank cards. They will change the cards every three to four months.
When the reporter requested to buy the counterfeit ID card which was used to register the ATM card, Hung did not agree because an ID card can be used to open ATM cards at many banks. If selling the ID card, Hung will not be able to sell the remaining cards.
For the Sacombank card given by Hung at the transaction (account number: 020063391xxx), the reporter tried to transfer an amount of money and withdrew cash at the nearest ATM. In a very short time, all transactions were reported to the phone number 01664612xxx (the SIM card Hung provided when selling the ATM card). This ATM card is fully capable of making transactions, payment and money transfers like a regular card; and user of this type of ATM card can make transaction without worrying about showing their identity. This is the tool to help scammers and users of illegal money.
Talking to reporter on this issue, economic expert Dr Nguyen Minh Phong said that the selling and buying of ATM cards will affect many aspects. Firstly, the buyers and users of the cards will not benefit. When there is problem with the accounts with different account holder’s names, they do not legal entity to complain to the bank. If bank detects the problem, this amount of money may be transferred to the real account owner. Secondly, for the State and banks, since these cards are not used by real owners, all the management of individual tax will not be identified and easily lost. Thirdly, this type of card may abet money laundering, extortion and other fraudulent transactions, etc. Dr Phong believed that the cause of this came from the loose management of banks.
“ID card counterfeiters never bring true photos to the bank. If the bank finds out but still makes the ATM card, they deliberately tolerate criminal acts. In this context, the State should have direction to early stop it. Meanwhile, banks need to find a way to prevent the provision of cards without real owners’ names”, said Dr Phong. According to Dr Phong, although this is illegal trading activity, there is no specific regulation to handle it.
