A typical ATM skimmer scam
byA reader wrote of an ATM experience which, soon after, led to $9,000 in fraudulent withdrawals. He was abroad, but this happens at ATMs…
A reader wrote of an ATM experience which, soon after, led to $9,000 in fraudulent withdrawals. He was abroad, but this happens at ATMs…
The Offer of a Flower is a Foil for Filching Palma de Mallorca, Spain— Bob and I trailed a trio of young women through…
Palma de Mallorca, Spain— Thirty to forty women practice this form of filching every day in Palma. They linger where the tourists are: around…
Pickpockets with flowers Palma de Mallorca, Spain— She looks like your grandmother—possibly even your great-grandmother. With a gap-toothed smile, she offers you a single…
I want to wail even in Sweden, because the country has long been perceived as enjoying a relatively low crime rate. And it did….
You can save up to 20% when you change money abroad if you shop around. Maybe more. I found myself in Rome recently, with…
In Bangkok, seemingly corrupt police are extorting large sums from foreign visitors. In South Africa, pseudo-cops are stopping drivers and pedestrians, requesting wallets in…
We good citizens are trained from an early age to respect authority. It’s not easy to ask a uniformed policeman for identification, or even…
We had a large and beautiful room at the Corinthia Lisboa Hotel in Lisbon. The business hotel’s casual restaurant, Tipico, is excellent, and features…
Bed bugs, we read, are living in hotels everywhere, dining on us. As a frequent hotel guest (200+ days a year for 16 years)…
After twenty years of baking this decadent dessert, which I’ve called by a name I’m quite fond of, I must finally, if fleetingly, commit…
I came across some calceteiros in the process of creating the gorgeous Portuguese mosaic sidewalks. In time, shoes polish the mosaics to a slippery…
Skimmers, officially called magnetic card readers, capture the data on a card’s magnetic strip. Exactly what information is that? Credit and debit cards have…
…¢ Identity theft is now the number one crime in the world. …¢ Las Vegas is number one in the U.S. for ID theft;…
I’m sure it sounds obsessive to mention the necessity of onboard watchfulness when you fly. The likelihood of theft while on an aircraft is…
A little background, as reference for my next post: A skimmer is a battery-operated device smaller than a deck of cards with a slot…
A former mortgage broker put 40 boxes of customers’ personal information into a Las Vegas dumpster. It was December 2006, but we all knew…
Thieves are thick on Lisbon’s two main tourist trams, 15 and 28. Within five minutes of arriving at a tram stop for #28, we’d…
Drink-drugging as a means to theft and/or sex is not new, but on the rise. It’s increasing in Colombia and known to be an…
Loot ‘n scoot: Through my police friends, I learned of another devious M.O. resulting in theft from hotel rooms. The thief simply poses as…
The Slovene driver sped along the autostrade, disco crackling on the radio, fast-chomping gum, taking and making phone calls as if he runs another…
When my friend, Stephen Kane, described what he witnessed on a recent afternoon in Buenos Aires, I begged him to write it down for…
I (@bobarno) recently wrote about my reluctance to use Twitter and the pros and cons of sharing information with everyone who might be a…
A travel snafu brought us to Homer, Alaska, where the best joint in town is the Bidarka Inn. Population 5,454; minus children, that would…
We flew from Anchorage to Homer on Alaska Airlines flight 4878, operated by ERA Aviation. No TSA. No screening; none at all. Liquids? Okay!…
Four days away from an international trip and Bob and I have no passports. Scary. They were perfectly good and valid still for five…
The moment Michael Griffith turned his back, his wife let out a bloodcurdling scream. He whipped around to see Nancy jumping up and down,…
A restaurant table is a good place to be had. The latest in low-tech scams happened last month in Hoboken, NJ, when a man…
I love to look at Bambi’s Twitter communication. Short snappy funny bitchy snarky bright messages 140 characters long. I envy her exchanges. I wish…
While in Africa with cousin Ty, he showed me a jury-rigged lizard catcher he made from a long, pliable twig and a piece of…