Reports of financial fraud across Capitol Hill and the entire Seattle area continue to be above normal levels as the impact of a bank and credit card rip-off scheme that targeted at least one neighborhood restaurant point of sale system continues to be felt even as Secret Service investigators have identified and "addressed" breach points. Here are the latest daily report totals from our tracking of Seattle Police Department dispatch data:
For the period included in this dataset, we show more than 320 reports of financial fraud in Seattle with more than 50% being reported by people who live or work on Capitol Hill. In a typical 15-day period, Seattle would have normally seen around 90 such reports, according to a CHS analysis.
Over the weekend, we rounded-up the latest coverage of the fraud wave by Seattle's big media entities including this Seattle Times report in which federal investigators claim there were at least two businesses targeted by the data thieves. CHS has reported that the Broadway Grill is the only Capitol Hill business that has been connected to the investigation at this point.
Meanwhile, a new report from banking industry Web site Bankinosecurity.com has some interesting notes that make the scenario that seems most likely to have played out on Broadway look like a hyperlocal version of what analysts are calling "flash attacks":
These attacks begin the same way, with criminals tampering with point of sale terminals to steal card data or take data from within the retailer's or business's payment network. Litan says that the twist comes when the criminals then turn and make hundreds or thousands of counterfeit debit cards and spread them among their army of accomplices, who use those counterfeit cards at the same time to withdraw as much money as they can before the issuers detect fraud and shut the cards off. In 10 minutes, the simultaneous withdrawals add up quickly -- $100,000 in stolen cash from the ATMs. Criminals repeat the same steps over a month and rack up a half-million.
So far, no suspects and no arrests have been announced in the Capitol Hill breaches.
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I know at least two people who were scammed who have not yet reported it to the police. So, the numbers are probably a bit higher. I reported mine on Thursday a few hours after I notified my bank.