Debit card fraud case grows

Codiac RCMP are now investigating more than 60 reports of debit card fraud in the Moncton area and a third business has been identified as a victim of the scam.

Police had previously been looking intoabout 30 incidents involving two point-of-sale locations. Some of the transactions totalled thousands of dollars.

Investigators are still looking fortwo suspectsin the case.

There are likely additional people who lost money from their bank accounts to the fraudsters, said Const. Damien Thriault.

Many people have only reported the unauthorized transactions to the banks, not police, he said.

"We remind the public to check their financial transaction records regularly to make sure they are not victim of fraud and if they do notice anything out of the ordinary in their statements, to contact their financial institution," said Thriault.

"And if they find they've been victim of fraud, they should contact their local police force."

Officers have confirmed that a debit machine at a convenience store on Amirault Street in Dieppe was also compromised, said Theriault.

Police believe two suspects replaced the stores debit machine on Feb. 18, making it possible for them to obtain banking information from all the cards swiped on that terminal.

"Based on video evidence, we can say that the suspector suspectsin this case are the same as in previous cases," he said.

Police previously releasedphotos of the two male suspectstaken from video surveillance.

The investigation so far has shown that the information stolen from the cards was used in a foreign country to obtain funds fraudulently.

Anyone with information about either individual is asked to contact RCMP at 506-857-2400 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS.

The other affected sites were a gas station convenience store on Champlain Street in Dieppe and a restaurant on Mountain Road in Moncton.

All of theaffected machines havebeen replaced, Thriault said.