European law-enforcement officials uncovered a highly sophisticated credit-card fraud ring that funnels account data to Pakistan from hundreds of grocery-store card machines across Europe, according to U.S. intelligence officials and other people familiar with the case.
Specialists say the theft technology is the most advanced they have seen, and a person close to British law enforcement said it has affected big retailers including a British unit of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Tesco Ltd.
The account data have been used to make repeated bank withdrawals and Internet purchases, such as airline tickets, in several countries including the U.S. Investigators haven't pinpointed the culprits. Early estimates of the losses range of $50 million to $100 million, but the figure could grow, said the person close to British law enforcement.
The scheme uses untraceable devices inserted into credit-card readers that were made in China.
The devices selectively send account data by a wireless connection to computer servers in Lahore, Pakisan, and constantly change the pattern of theft so it is hard to detect, officials say.
"Pretty small but intelligent criminal organizations are pulling off transnational, multicontinent heists that only a foreign intelligence service would have been able to do a few years ago," said Joel F. Brenner, the U.S. government's top counterintelligence officer.
U.S. intelligence officials, including senior National Security Agency officials, are monitoring the case, in part because of its ties to Pakistan, which has become home to a resurgent al Qaeda.
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