PIN Crackers Nab Holy Grail of Bank Card Security | Threat Level from Wired.com

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2009/04/pins.html

Hackers have crossed into new frontiers by devising sophisticated ways  
to steal large amounts of personal identification numbers, or PINs,  
protecting credit and debit cards, says an investigator.  The attacks  
involve both unencrypted PINs and encrypted PINs that attackers have  
found a way to crack, according to an investigator behind a new report  
looking at the data breaches.
The attacks, says Bryan Sartin, director of investigative response for  
Verizon Business, are behind some of the millions of dollars in  
fraudulent ATM withdrawals that have occurred around the United States.
"We're seeing entirely new attacks that a year ago were thought to be  
only academically possible," says Sartin. Verizon Business released a  
report Wednesday that examines trends in security breaches. "What we  
see now is people going right to the source ... and stealing the  
encrypted PIN blocks and using complex ways to un-encrypt the PIN  
blocks."

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