International Law

Airport kiosks suspected in fraud probe

This morning's Globe & Mail ran a story about an apparent connection between a rash of credit card fraud and the check-in kiosks at Toronto's Pearson International Airport. The Airport Authority has said they've checked them out and think all is well:

WestJet suspends credit-card kiosk check-ins amid fraud probe

...Earlier Wednesday, a spokesman for the Greater Toronto Airport Authority said a recent audit demonstrated the kiosks, used to check in and pick up boarding passes, were safe and secure.

"We checked our systems and everything checks out, so we're happy with that," said Scott Armstrong.

Meanwhile, airlines have disabled the ability to use a credit card to check in.

From today's Globe:

globeandmail.com: Credit-card fraud probe targets Pearson's self-service kiosks

An investigation of suspected credit-card fraud at Toronto's Pearson airport is now concentrating on the security of its 150 self-service check-in kiosks.

In recent months, financial institutions that issue credit cards spotted isolated fraud patterns that appeared to stem from use of the cards in conjunction with getting boarding passes at the Pearson kiosks, according to sources.

While the investigation is in the early stages, it is currently focused on the kiosks, where passengers use passports, frequent-flier cards, reservation numbers, names, and/or credit card data to identify themselves for flights on any one of 13 airlines. It is not known whether any information has actually been stolen or otherwise gone astray.

Some members of the financial industry are very concerned because Pearson is Canada's busiest airport, with 31.5 million passengers travelling through it last year.

One person familiar with the investigation said the fact that personal data at airports might not be secure ?should send shudders through every airport traveller.? ...

Full post as published by The Canadian Privacy Law Blog on July 23, 2008 (boomark / email).