BankersOnline Security Spotlight

Observe your branches' opening procedures to be sure they are performed properly. Many opening teams take shortcuts if they don't believe this procedure is necessary.By arriving early and watching from a distance you can perform a surprise inspection.If the opening team isn't following proper opening procedures, now is the time to hold a security training session for the entire office.
Training Webinars
Payment Processor Relationships - Revised Guidance
April 10 —
by Paul Carrubba and Dan Fisher

As baby boomers age "elder fraud" will become the fastest growing swindle in our country. Elder fraud often goes unreported because the victims don't want anyone to know they were deceived.This webinar will instruct you on how to pinpoint suspicious transactions on senior citizens' accounts and the steps your institution should take to notify and protect your elderly customers.

Bogus Cashier's Checks: Protecting Your Bank and Customers
May 10—
by John Burnett

Each counterfeit cashier's check or other official check that is deposited in a financial institution means trouble. Trouble for the bank. And more trouble for the depositor who is duped by the scam artist profiting from the depositor's misery. This program is designed to help your bank recognize the signs of bogus cashier's check activity.Technological Advances to Improve Security: What's Available
May 25—
by Susan Orr

The technology age has brought a plethora of products and services that have changed how we live, work, and play. Look at the technology and processes your institution has implemented: Websites, email, online banking, bill payment, merchant capture, mobile banking, and more! These technological advances come withincreased risks and the need for security and monitoring. This presentation will provide an overview of some of the products and services available to help financial institutions improve security, reduce risks, and increase productivity.
Security Products
in the Banker Store

The Beginning Security Officers Series!


Identity Theft and Data Security


Combatting Internal Fraud Before it Happens




"Social Engineering"
What the Red Flag Regulations Missed

Welcome to the April issue of Security Spotlight
In this month's Security Spotlight, March winds blew in some poorly educated bank robbers, bank employees who thought they were entitled to some of the bank's money, and a varied collection of CrimeDex alerts! Banks got a bad rap in a syndicated news story - read about that and some other interesting discussions in our Bankers Threads forums.
Flunked Bank Robbery 101
Waited patiently - A bank robber in West Palm Beach, FL arrived at the Sabadell United Bank equipped with two things - beer cans and patience.Robert Henderson, 59, approached the teller and demanded she fill up a bag containing beer cans with money.The teller complied with his request but politely asked the bandit to take a seat in the lobby while she gathered his loot. Henderson took a seat and waited as requested, giving the teller the opportunity to activate the silent alarm and police to arrive on the scene. They arrested Henderson on the bank steps when he walked out of the bank.Henderson was charged with bank robbery and the stolen money was recovered, along with the beer cans.

Should have studied before the test...
A Milwaukee bank robber probably wishes he had studied for his crash course in bank robbery BEFORE he took his final test. After robbing a Bank Mutual branch located across the street from the federal courthouse in Milwaukee and making his escape by foot, the bandit ran right in front of an Assistant Police Chief and a Lieutenant who had just heard the robbery call come across their radio. Following a brief pursuit, police arrested the alleged thief. In retrospect, the bank robber probably wishes he had studied, or at least read, the book police found in his possession when they arrested him: "How to Be A Successful Criminal." He will have plenty of reading time on his hands now.

Check our Bank Robbery page for photos and information on the latest robbery suspects. Of the 42 unknown bank bandits featured in our suspects gallery for March, 37 entered the bank wearing a hat or some other type of head covering to disguise their identity. Asking customers to remove hats, hoods and sunglasses could help reduce the number of bandits who target your bank. We have a sign for that! (available in the Banker Store)


Inside Jobs, Mixing it Up and a Bad Rap for Banks

The teller stole All The Money - Lorena Salazar, a lead teller for Chase bank, decided "ATM" meant that "All The Money" she needed was hers. Over a four month period in 2010, tasked with the responsibility of filling the bank's ATMs, Salazar filled her pockets instead with $150,000. When an audit conducted on one of the ATMs Salazar was servicing revealed the count was off, the audit was expanded and the shortage discovered. When confronted with the theft, Salazar claimed she "had been approached by a male who identified himself as a member of a Mexican drug cartel. The male threatened to kidnap the Salazars' 14-year-old daughter unless they paid the cartel $150,000." Her story has not been corroborated.

This was not part of the new hire training - A branch manager and a new teller, Joel Thomas, were opening their branch office one morning last February at 7:30 when a gunman forced his way into the bank.Pointing his pistol at the manager (but not at Thomas), the gunman forced the manager into the vault. Surveillance video showed Thomas walking behind the gunman, who made no attempt to control or even look at Thomas. Further investigation revealed that while working at a previous bank, Thomas was allegedly involved in a fraudulent debit card scam currently under investigation, leading police to Thomas' association with Billy Wayne Brymer III, who fit the gunman's description in this robbery. When police searched Brymer's home and car, they found documents containing bank account numbers and personal information of dozens of people, note cards demanding money from the bank, and a sweatshirt matching the one worn in the bank heist. They also found phone records showing that Thomas and Brymer had communicated the night before and the morning of the bank robbery. Sure looks like an inside job!

Bad rap for banks- As if banks aren't struggling enough with a negative image, ABC news carried a story, "How to Rob a Bank and Get Away With It" that leaves consumers with some misconceptions about bank crimes. The story seems to suggest that many bank crimes are insider crimes, that when the loss is less than $100,000 it doesn't get investigated, and that banks will increase their customers' fees to make up for the loss. Of course we know the truth behind the myths in this story. Security officers do investigate losses and often recover some or all of the loss, even when law enforcement doesn't pursue an arrest or prosecute the offender. We don't think the ABC story was a true reflection of the facts. What do you think? Look for the discussion linked in our BOL threads section and weigh in with your comments.

Fire, really - fire! - You train your staff on robbery procedures, paying attention to small details, and how to avoid losses. We read often in the news about bomb threats where there was no bomb. But sometimes there really is a bomb, and you have to treat every threat as real until you know it's not. In Oakridge, OR, the Siuslaw Bank recently severe fire damage that officials believe was caused by a power surge. When fire crews arrived at the bank, smoke was billowing from three sides of the building. You can imagine the confusion as employees were forced to evacuate the building. This story brings up the question: when was the last time you did a mock run through, or in-depth discussion of bank evacuation procedures? While the safety of your customers and your employees is a priority, during the confusion the security of teller drawers, vault doors, open safe deposit boxes, laptops on desks and access to the bank in general is paramount also. Once everyone is safely evacuated, offices and restrooms as well as open closets should be checked. Upon re-entry to the building, those areas should be checked again. This type of threat level training may be neglected at times in favor of traditional robbery training, but all these scenarios need to be addressed and planned for.

Mix 'n match robbery rash - One man. One day. Three banks. First stop: Bank of America (BofA) in North Miami, 9:05 a.m., wearing sunglasses and a light blue polo shirt. Second stop: TD Bank in Miami Shores at 10:15 a.m., wearing a red polo shirt and a black cap. Third stop: Entered Hialeah Bank of America at 2 p.m., same red polo shirt on with sunglasses. Reginald Watkins was running his "errands" - at three different banks. Watkins visited the BofA branch first, demanded cash, but got nervous and left empty handed. His visit was captured on the bank's surveillance video. Although he changed his shirt from a blue polo to a red polo, he was seen an hour later on video at TD Bank demanding - and getting - some cash. Several hours later he paid another visit to a BofA branch in Hialeah, where he was once again caught on video demanding cash and fleeing with the money. With all his exposure, Watkins was soon apprehended by the Miami-Dade Police Department and members of the South Florida Violent Crime Fugitive Task Force.

Alerts & Threads
If you are looking for peer-to-peer discussions with other security officers, you will find some interesting topics on general security issues being discussed in the public security forum. The ABC story mentioned in our Security Shorts is one of those. Read more about what was said, what your peers think and add your comments here. You will also find a discussion about forged and missing endorsements in this thread. But don't stop there. The Public Security forum was also the hot spot for discussions on security training, seminars, physical security reports and more!

The Private Forum area has two security sections where more sensitive discussions take place over things like key logs, unusual emails that really were from the FDIC, phishing emails, camera placement, the Nigerian scam and a lot more.All these topics and more are being discussed in the Private Security and Private +Law Enforcement forums.

To comment in the BOL threads you must be a registered user. You can register here. If using your bank email account, you will be given access to the private forums. If you are already registered for the threads, but don't yet have access to the private forums, using your bank email address send a request for access to andyz@bankersonline.com. Once your registration request is approved, you can access the Private Security forum here.




March CrimeDex Alerts a Varied Collection
CrimeDex subscribers received another collection of widely-varied alerts in March. The month started with a report from a west-coast credit union of fraudulent checks drawn on a non-existent United Parcel Service account. That was followed by a warning from a major bank issuer of credit cards concerning fraudulent applications from all over the country, mail fraud, and use of the cards in the Los Angeles area. There was a report about thousands of dollars in counterfeit $100 bills passed in Chicago-area Walmart stores. A California police department broadcast an alert on credit card fraud and identity theft involving the embossing of actual credit card numbers and CVV values on prepaid cards and the purchasing of high-end merchandise after convincing sales clerks to key in card information when the mag stripes didn't work.

Later in the month, ING Direct reported two account takeover incidents originating with a phishing email. Diebold, law enforcement and victim banks posted an alert about brute-force attacks on ATMs, along with a list of enhanced ATM security measures suggested by Diebold officials.

BOL CrimeDex can help your bank recover losses through cooperation with law enforcement, retailers and other bank security professionals. Subscribers can also help avoid losses by using CrimeDex alerts as training examples for staff members.

CrimeDex is now FREE to registered members of the Bankers' Threads
Private Security Forum! Get the details and subscribe now!

Blogging on Facebook
There are several recent security-related entries posted on our BOL Facebook page. If you are interested in data collection on monetary instruments, or the growing use (and threat) of mobile phones for banking, check out these hot topics on ourFacebook page and post your thoughts and comments.

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