Clever Hackers Are Making ATMs Spit Out All Their Money

Jackpot!

Make It Rain

A major ATM sales and services company is warning that thieves have found a new way of "jackpotting" ATM machines — causing them to spit out massive wads of cash, Ars Technica reports.

Jackpotting involves attaching rogue devices called "black boxes" to open up programming interfaces inside the ATM machine's software and issue commands, forcing it to, proverbially, make it rain.

According to a statement issued by multinational banking solutions corporation Diebold Nixdorf, thieves have worked out a new way to get their hands of copious amounts of cash.

Brute Force

The hacks typically involve a combination of brute force and cyberattack savvy.

"In the recent incidents, attackers are focusing on outdoor systems and are destroying parts of the fascia in order to gain physical access to the head compartment," reads the security alert. After getting inside of the ATM, the thieves hook up special USB devices, in order to trigger the banking machine to dispense money.

Big in Europe

According to Diebold Nixdorf, the new scheme is mostly occurring in "certain European countries," and appears to largely affect one common type of ATM machine.

Previous jackpotting approaches involved the use of black boxes that were even able to change the maximum amount a given ATM was authorized to spit out.

There is a silver lining to the latest hack, as Ars Technica points out. The thieves' new approach doesn't seem to target the retrieval of personal banking information, as has been the case with previous schemes.

READ MORE: Crooks have acquired proprietary Diebold software to “jackpot” ATMs [Ars Technica]

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