Credit Card BIN Attacks

Artificial intelligence is enjoying its moment as the villain of the week, and an increasing number of people find it plausible to attribute emotions such as enjoyment to artificial intelligence.  A few decades ago, the thought of robots making decisions that would cast individual human beings, or even humankind in general, into peril was the stuff of science fiction; it required some imagination to write it and some suspension of disbelief to read it.  Today, every clickbait news story tells of decisions that bots, which lack empathy but are apparently capable of Schadenfreude, can, do, or will make on our behalf; perhaps bots themselves are the authors of some of these stories.  Does it see, naïve, then, to blame your devices when you get accused of a financial crime?  Bots are perfectly capable of committing crimes, and it appears that credit card BIN attacks are their brand new bag.  Here, our Miami white collar crime lawyer explains the recent phenomenon of credit card BIN attacks, as well as defenses that you can use if you get accused of participating in one.

The Many Faces of Credit Card Fraud

The term “credit card fraud” encompasses many types of misconduct involving credit cards.  These are just some of the scenarios that can lead to you facing criminal charges for credit card fraud:

• Someone you know, including but not limited to a family member, shared their credit card information with you and authorized you to make a transaction with it, but you also made other transactions that the account holder did not authorize.
• You have access to the credit card information in the context of your work, because customers keep payment information on file. You made personal transactions with someone else’s credit card information without the account holder’s information, or you shared the credit card information with someone else, including but not limited to by taking a photo of the credit card.
• You bought someone else’s credit card information from a hacker, or else you personally participated in a data breach that led to the theft of credit card information.
• You used a credit card skimming device to obtain someone else’s credit card information illegally, or you bought or otherwise received the credit card information from someone who did this.

What’s New About BIN Attacks?

A credit card BIN attack involves guessing credit card numbers, which used to be so difficult and time-consuming that it was one of the less common forms of credit card fraud.  Recent technological advances have made BIN attacks easier to accomplish. BIN stands for bank identification number; it is the credit card equivalent of the routing number on a check.  The BIN is the first six digits of a credit card; the same BIN appears on all credit cards issued by the same bank.  Beyond the BIN, credit cards have ten digits, for a total of sixteen.  The last ten digits of the credit card number are unique to each card.

Recently, people have managed to program artificial intelligence bots so that they can enter strings of six digits, at a pace that only bots can sustain, until they find a valid BIN.  Then they start guessing individual card numbers until they find a real one, and from there, they can attempt fraudulent transactions.  It would take you or me months, if not years, of work to guess a real credit card number, but bots can do it quickly.  Most of the time, the card issuers flag the transaction before it can post to the customer’s account, but sometimes BIN attacks can lead to fraudulent transactions that reach completion.

Am I My Bot’s Keeper?

Bots can guess BIN numbers and the individual account numbers attached to them, but it takes a human being to make a fraudulent transaction.  Most BIN attack cases, like many financial crime cases, involve conspiracy.  If you are charged with conspiracy to commit credit card fraud, you can only be convicted if prosecutors prove what your specific role was in the fraudulent scheme.  If you can cast doubt on any of the elements of their case against you, you can cast doubt on your guilt, and the jury must acquit you.  You can still be charged with an inchoate offense, in other words, attempt or conspiracy, if the BIN attack did not yield any fraudulent transactions that caused cardholders to lose money.

Contact Our Criminal Defense Attorneys

A South Florida criminal defense lawyer can help you if you are facing charges for participating in a credit card BIN attack.  Contact Ratzan & Faccidomo in Miami, Florida for a confidential consultation about your case.

Source:

msn.com/en-us/money/personalfinance/what-is-a-bin-attack-on-a-credit-card-understanding-this-type-of-credit-card-fraud/ar-AA1p3ILW?ocid=msedgntp&pc=ACTS&cvid=b4fc8be817b040aba8a60002df29383b&ei=15