Man Clones Gift Cards and Makes $6000 Before Betting Caught
22-year-old Sealtiel Chacon Zepeda from Beaverton, Oregon had an interesting scam going involving gift cards. Instead of just stealing gift cards from people who purchased them he decided to copy un-purchased gift cards from stores instead. He knew the gift cards wouldn’t be any good until activated at the register so he went into his local Fred Meyer store and stole several gift cards. He took them home and used a card scanner, he bought off the internet, to record the cards information. He then snuck the cards back into the store and waited for people to purchase the cards.
When a special program detected someone had purchased one of his cards he then copied the information back onto another card. With his newly cloned card he then could make purchases for personal or re-sale. You could even turn the cards into cash by returning items bought with the gift cards.
His crime spree came to an end back in February 2009 when the police arrested him, but not before he managed to steal $6,000 worth of goods from stores like Abercrombie & Fitch, Apple and Best Buy, among others. Zepeda pleaded guilty to the five counts of computer crimes and was sentenced to 18 months in prison. There have been several other instances of this same scam popping up after Zepeda did it, but none that blindsided police like Zepeda’s scam.
22-year-old Sealtiel Chacon Zepeda from Beaverton, Oregon had an interesting scam going involving gift cards. Instead of just stealing gift cards from people who purchased them he decided to copy un-purchased gift cards from stores instead. He knew the gift cards wouldn’t be any good until activated at the register so he went into his local Fred Meyer store and stole several gift cards. He took them home and used a card scanner, he bought off the internet, to record the cards information. He then snuck the cards back into the store and waited for people to purchase the cards.
When a special program detected someone had purchased one of his cards he then copied the information back onto another card. With his newly cloned card he then could make purchases for personal or re-sale. You could even turn the cards into cash by returning items bought with the gift cards.
His crime spree came to an end back in February 2009 when the police arrested him, but not before he managed to steal $6,000 worth of goods from stores like Abercrombie & Fitch, Apple and Best Buy, among others. Zepeda pleaded guilty to the five counts of computer crimes and was sentenced to 18 months in prison. There have been several other instances of this same scam popping up after Zepeda did it, but none that blindsided police like Zepeda’s scam.
Tags: gift card scam, identity theft, identity theft protection