Georgia Fuel Inspectors Check For Credit Card Skimmers
State fuel inspectors are checking more carefully for illegal credit card skimmers at Georgia gas stations. The skimmers are small devices that can be attached to gas pumps and can secretly collect your credit card or debit card information.
Exavier Nash opens up the front of a gas pump at a gas station in the East Lake neighborhood of Atlanta. He’s a state fuel inspector and is checking for an illegal credit card skimmer. Then, he puts his hand on the credit card reader.
“We also kind of wiggle the card slot. If it kind of extends from the pump, we kind of wiggle that to make sure no one has put anything over that,” Nash says. “We check the keypads to make sure if they’re flat keypads no one has put anything on top of that.”
A few minutes later, he gives the pump the all clear.
“There’s nothing affixed to the credit card reader or keypad, so everything looks to be in good order,” he says.
So far, Nash and other Georgia fuel inspectors haven’t found any illegal skimmers, but at least one gas station owner in the state has. In fact, Florida fuel inspectors recently found more than 100 skimming devices during a sweep of gas stations. They’ve also popped up in Alabama. That’s why Georgia commissioner of agriculture, Gary Black, says his department’s inspectors are checking more closely for the skimmers.
“Anytime when you’ve got evidence of this taking place right next door, we want to be vigilant and help get the word out, and hopefully this will be incredibly discouraging to those would-be criminals,” Black says.
Black says the department is also working with the Georgia Association of Convenience Stores and the Georgia Oilmen’s Association to inform gas stations about the skimmer scam.
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