How could it be possible that one can use vip card to withdraw cash from ATM machines? Bank card frauds appeared in two Chinese cities. Thanks to the local police, the two criminal gangs were quickly cracked. How did the police make it? Tune into Frontline on Monday in the second half of the hour. Please stay with this week's Frontline: Black Hands From Overseas.

Anchor: Hello, and welcome to another edition of Frontline, the weekly feature story brought to you by China Radio International. I'm your host, Wu Jia.

It's common for Chinese people to use credit cards and debit cards nowadays. But can you believe that someone could use a vip card to withdraw cash from an ATM machine? Such things happened in Fuzhou, the capital city of Southeast China's Fujian province three months ago. Let’s follow our reporter Yang Lei to find out more.

Reporter: It was at the beginning of this August, right before the Beijing Olympics began. A branch of Bank of China received a phone call from the headquarters in Fuzhou that several fake overseas credit cards had been traced in the city.

Lu Qingjun is the bank's branch director of the Security Department.

"Once the headquarters warned us, we started the emergency plan in anticipation of potential credit card fraud during the Olympics. As many host countries in the past had similar problems, we knew we would be targeted by international criminal gangs of bank card fraud."

The feeling at the bank was a tense one. The best technicians were summoned to take 24 hours surveillance on the bank cards.

Huang Xiangdong is the bank's Branch Director of the Financing Department.

"Three people were specially assigned to watch the monitor screen. Once the suspected card numbers appeared, we would inform the local branches immediately."

Several days passed. No suspected credit cards were traced. But right on the night of the opening ceremony of the Beijing 2008 Olympic games, the monitor in the bank beeped. The suspected credit cards turned up.

Huang Xiangdong remembers the moment clearly.

"It was at 7:30 pm that the credit card was detected as being used."

People in the bank had locked down the location of the ATM machine where the suspect was trying to withdraw money. They immediately rushed to scene, only to find the suspect was gone.

"When we arrived, we found an empty bank. The suspect had fled".

To Huang's joy, they found the credit cards stuck in the ATM machine. There were six of them! Huang Xiangdong, the director, was also surprised after taking them out from the machine.

"They were all hospital cards, beauty cards and VIP cards."

How could people withdraw cash from the ATM machine with these kinds of cards? Huang took them back to the bank and began the analysis. They found that although they didn't look like credit cards, the magnetic bars on the cards are real ones. Since credit card information can be rewritten into the magnetic bars, the fake cards could indeed withdraw money like the real credit cards.

More clues were found.

"The first 6 digits of the serial numbers on the cards were the same. According to international rules, people can tell which bank issued the credit cards from the first six numbers. We found all six cards were from the same bank, the same overseas bank. "

The first 6 digits of a credit card's serial numbers are called the bin code. The cards issued by the same bank should have the same bin code worldwide. Confirming this, Huang and his colleagues began the surveillance on all credit cards with the same bin code in the city.

Later, the bank retrieved the video recordings of the suspect from the ATM machine. Obviously, the man in the recording used make up to mask his identity.

Here is Lu Qingjun, director of the security department.

"He was wearing a cap to cover his head. He also had a pair of sun glasses on, covering his eyes."

These two clues helped a lot. All people in different bank branches in the city were informed about the features of this suspect. At 9 o'clock the next morning, the suspected credit cards with the bin code appeared again. The suspect on the CCTV monitor looked quite like the previous one in the video recording. He was holding a name card holder full of different cards.

"We could tell from the monitor that some of the cards were not credit cards at all."

Some undercover guards in the bank were immediately sent. They secretly approached the suspect and watched him withdrawing money with fake cards. The suspect, unaware that he had been caught, was trying to leave after withdrawing money. He was immediately detained by the guards on watch. The bank's security guards then reported the incident to the police in Fuzhou.

Another dramatic scene was unfolding as the police were on their way to the bank. A new man was withdrawing money at the same ATM machine with the same bin code fake cards. This man also had a thick name card holder in hand. But this one was more alert. Aware that something was not right he set off running. The policemen came up and arrested him.

Huang Xiangdong recalled the scene.

"He was holding some twenty cards in the hand. They are all kinds including sauna ones, beauty salon ones and vip ones like the ones stuck in the ATM machine previously. Apparently, he was using fake credit cards."

The police concluded that the suspects detained must belong to a bank card fraud gang. They steal credit card information and passwords to duplicate new cards, and then they use the fake card to withdraw money in China.

Anchor: The gang must be cracked. The police found the two suspects were from Fujian. How could they steal bank cards information overseas? Were there black hands behind manipulating them? China's Ministry of Public Security has been aware of the new form of crime emerged in China.

Zhang Tao is Vice director of the Finance Crime Bureau under the Ministry of Public Security.

"Bank card fraud was rampant in Southeast Asian nations and has severely damaged the finance stability in the region. People didn't use credit cards at all. The government realized how serious the situation was and cracked down on the crime. The criminals then had to turn to other countries in the region including China."

Anchor: The black hands of bankcard crime are reaching to China. Some of them are manipulating outside the country, while some of them are committing the crime themselves within.

Police in Fujian province arrested two suspects and are hunting the rest in the gang. In the meantime, the police in east China's Shanghai were also hunting a similar suspect. This one was believed to be a foreigner staying in China.

Reporter:

One night this June, an agent from a travel agency in Shanghai reported to the local police that the agency had been cheated of 600 thousand yuan or 87 thousand US dollars worth of plane tickets.

Mr. Li is with the agency.

"We started a new business targeting foreign clients in March. They could buy tickets from us by phone calls. What they need to provide were passport copies and credit card numbers. And they could pay through POS machines."

The travel agency's business increased. Many foreigners bought tickets through POS machines. But in June, the Bank of China informed that it had to stop the service for the agency as illegal transactions occurred.

"The bank issued a formal notice saying among all the transactions, 3 visa credit cards were fake. We felt something was not right and tried to contact the man who booked the tickets. But his phone was not reachable."

The three fake visa cards belonged to the same man. The passport showed that he was from the United States. The total value of the air tickets he booked surpassed 600 thousand yuan. He himself never appeared in the agency as all the transactions were done through the net.

Zhuang Xiaoqi is a sergeant of finance crime department under the Shanghai Public Security bureau.

"It is the first time I encountered this kind of fraud. And it was the case of a suspect using fake credit cards to buy air tickets. It was a tough one because it was very hard to identify the suspect. All we had at the time was only documentary copies."

The only clue was the copies of the passport and the credit card. The sergeant tried his best to find more details.

"We checked and there indeed existed such a man using the name in the passport. But it seemed so strange that he could commit the crime in China when records showed that he was outside China. So we drew a first conclusion that someone was committing a crime in China under the cover of another's name."

Anchor: Apparently, the suspect was using someone else' passport. The police checked the three credit cards and found they were real ones. But the card holders are all in the United States and had never visited China. The police realized that they are facing a cunning gang of credit card forgers.

Reporter:

Altogether, the suspect bought several hundred air tickets. Was it possible to start the investigation by interrogating hundreds of ticket buyers? Here is Zhuang Xiaoqi.

"All ticket buyers are foreigners. They were everywhere around the world. And it was very hard to find them and carry the investigation. It was so clueless for us at the beginning."

When the investigation came to a stall, a new tip came. Another travel agency in Shanghai reported that 400 thousand yuan air tickets were bought with fraudulent cards.

"This case was pretty much the same as the previous one. It was also an American man using a fake US passport and credit cards."

The two cases were amazingly identical. Could it be the same American? The police decided to start the investigation with the buyers.

"After an analysis of both cases, we found we could track them using the buyers' information. Carefully comparing the two lists of the buyers' names in both cases, we found a Ghanaian man called Kaya very suspicious. This man at the same time bought air tickets through the two agencies between March and June."

After confirming the suspect, the police carried out further investigation and found he left different mobile phone numbers when booking air tickets at the two agencies.

"The mobile phone numbers were both from South China's Guangdong province. And neither of the phones were on. After retrieving the telephone messages we found one of the mobile phones tried to contact another travel agency in Shanghai at the beginning of June."

The police went to the travel agency immediately, and found an important clue. Here's Zhuang Xiaoqi again.

"Between the end of May and beginning of June, the American Man called Kaya also bought 180,000 yuan worth of air tickets using foreign credit cards. After all three cases, we confirmed that the Ghanaian Kaya was our top suspect."

Anchor:

After confirming with the credit card cartels, it was found Kaya was using duplicated cards. The air ticket bookings were cancelled. The Shanghai police began searching for Kaya. They found that the Ghanaian man, who was in his 30s, had left China and gone back to Ghana.

Reporter: The investigation again ran into difficulties as the suspect had left China.

"This man returned to Ghana at the beginning of June. He was outside China, making it very hard for us to carry out the investigation."

The Shanghai Police didn't give up. They believed since the suspect succeeded in the first two cases, he would not give up trying for more, and he would be back to China soon. The police informed all customs in China and asked for help in detaining this man.

"We sent undercover agents to all major customs in China. We told them that if a man called Kaya tried to enter China, they should detain him and inform us, the police in Shanghai, as soon as possible."

Anchor: The two independent bank card fraud cases in Shanghai and Fuzhou were found right before the Beijing Olympics. The Ministry of Public Security urged the local police bureau to crack them as soon as possible. A breakthrough was first made in Fuzhou.

Reporter:

The police in Fuzhou tried not to alert the bank card gangs and interrogated the two detained suspects only. Finally one of them broke down and revealed everything.

"One of the suspects told us the head was called A Xiong. They were all from Fujian province. They stayed in room 304 in a compound in Fuzhou city."

After getting the tip, the Fuzhou police made a detailed plan to arrest them. On the afternoon of August 9th, 2008, the Fuzhou police cracked down the gang and found scores of duplicated cards. The police found a credit card writer, and a lot of bank account information in one of the floppy disks.

"After obtaining the evidence, we felt we could rest a little bit. We found the hideout place. We arrested another two suspects. They all matched with video recordings. We were greatly relieved."

The 4 suspects could do nothing but confess in the face of so much evidence. They told the police all they did. The head of the gang of four was called A Xiong. He was 29. In 2005, he was smuggled into the United Kingdom, and joined a bank card fraud gang there.

After learning all the tricks in Britain, A Xiong went back home in China. Without anything to do, A Xiong decided to pick up the old trade and contacted a man called Peter. He bought some bank account information from Peter, recruited three other accomplices. Their plan was to steal money from foreigners who came for the Beijing Olympics.

A Xiong sent the other three to collect used cards with magnetic bars. In a short while, they gathered a large amount of beauty salon cards, sauna cards, and vip cards. Then A Xiong bought a card writer online, with which he rewrote the bank account information into the used cards.

After producing the fake cards, A Xiong told the other three the passwords of each card. Then they began withdrawing money from ATM machines in Fuzhou. In no more than 7 days, they stole 388,000 yuan altogether.

To everyone's joy, the gang was soon busted and no more economic damage was caused.

Anchor: In the police circle, the ones who steal bank accounts are called the "head", and the ones who withdraw money are called the "hand". The Chinese police informed the security bureau in Britain, helping them to nab the "head."

Now let's come back to Shanghai. The Ghanaian suspect Kaya took away air tickets worth more than one million yuan. The Shanghai police set up a trap and waited for him to come back.

Reporter:

One evening, right after office hours, Zhuang Xiaoqi received a phone call from the police in South China's Shenzhen. He was told that a man named Kaya was detained at Shenzhen Customs.

"Our judgment was right! So I said to them I would fly to Shenzhen as soon as possible. I was so excited at that moment."

Zhuang Xiaoqi flew to Shenzhen that night and met Kaya in Shenzhen. In the beginning, Kaya denied everything. Soon, the police opened his laptop and retrieved a large number of fake bankcards and passport information. Kaya had to confess this time.

"The suspect started his crimes from March. He stole bank accounts from the Internet. And then began looking for Chinese ticket agencies which provide POS services. After locking down the target, Kaya would call these agencies and book tickets."

Kaya also admitted that copies of the passport were edited in his computer.

"In the suspect's laptop, we had found an incomplete American passport. We noticed that the name of the passport, and the serial numbers had already been edited. And the card was issued by VISA."

After all the preparations, Kaya contacted some ticket agencies and claimed that he could buy discounted air tickets. Then with a long list of travelers, Kaya turned to the travel agencies to buy air tickets.

"Kaya bought discounted air tickets from travel agencies and sold them to the ticket agencies. In this way, he made a big profit from scores of air tickets valued at thousands to tens of thousands of yuan."

In only three months, the suspect sold air tickets of more than one million yuan to ticket agencies. It was a new crime and not easy to be recognized in a short while.

Zhuang Xiaoqi explained.

"The time span was very important. The criminal was taking advantage of it. Since the transactions took place offline, it was very hard for the real card holders to notice. When he or she really found out, it was usually several months later."

Anchor: The suspects of the two separate cases were arrested at last. Such crimes involving transnational bank fraud cause great damage, and are still endangering the safety of international financial system.

Credit cards in China are quite common nowadays. The latest report shows that every card holder has more than 3 cards in their wallet. With the increasing flow of outbound travelers, Chinese credit cards are also often used overseas.

The police warned that crimes involving bank cards will very likely increase rapidly in the future. Individuals and companies, which have foreign businesses, should be alert to such crimes. Thorough evaluation of the identity of the clients and the bank cards must be carried out.

More importantly, one should verify the transaction once it is made, by contacting the Bank of China and the credit card issuer overseas. Only in this way, it will leave little space for the criminals.

With that, we end this week's "Frontline". If you have any comments and suggestions, don't hesitate to write to us, either by email or post. Our address is frontline@cri.com.cn. Alternatively, you can send a letter to: English Service, China Radio International, Beijing, China. The postal code is 100040. I am Wu Jia. Thank you for listening. Until next week, goodbye.