ATM SKIMMER GETS 3 YEARS JAIL

[AussieMark]

ATM skimmer gets three years' jail

An illegal Malaysian immigrant was jailed for funding his stay in Australia by stealing more than $600,000 from personal bank accounts, in the biggest ATM skimming scam to hit the country.

Kok Meng Ng was sentenced in the NSW District Court to three years' jail for his role in the automatic teller machine (ATM) ruse, in which 315 Sydney bank customers were robbed between May 2001 and November 2002.

More than 12 detectives investigated the fraud, which originated in Malaysia and was the first of its kind to come before the courts in Australia.

The fraud was carried out using a device placed in the card slots of 36 ATMs around Sydney.

The device read and recorded information from debit and credit cards' magnetic strips, while a tiny camera mounted on the ATMs recorded the users' personal identification number (PIN).

Ng then reproduced replica bank cards and used them to steal $623,426.91 from Commonwealth, St George and Westpac Bank customers.

He then siphoned the money into two separate offshore bank accounts in sums of less than $10,000 - thus enabling the transactions to go unreported.

Authorities caught onto the intricate scam when customers complained their accounts had been tampered with and the St George Bank looked into Ng's account.

It found he had made 64 transactions over 18 months, depositing about $200,000 in bank accounts held by the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation.

Ng, who originally came to Australia on a tourist visa, originally pleaded guilty to four offences under the Commonwealth Financial Transactions Act.

He later confessed to nine more offences, including stealing data and exporting money in August this year.

In sentencing Ng, Judge James Black said the scam was a "serious attack on the fabric of life in this country".

"This offender was not the instigator of the whole enterprise but in the absence of evidence I infer that he was perfectly aware of what was happening," Judge Black said.

"I infer (Ng) funded his stay here by means of his illegal activities."

Outside the court, NSW Fraud Squad Detective Gordon Arbinja said he was happy to see the end of the scam, which could have cost millions if it had gone unchecked.

"It's the first of its kind in this country ... and we are very happy we have impacted on stopping this crime," he said.

Det Arbinja said no similar scams had been reported since Ng's arrest.

Police managed to recover $34,000 from Ng and the court ordered the money be returned to the banks affected.

Ng will be eligible for release from April 16, 2005 but will be deported back to Malaysia immediately