Lawyers for thousands of New Yorkers who had their public benefits stolen through automatic teller machine and credit-card “skimming” fraud are urging city and state officials to recoup people’s stolen money and upgrade to cards with better protections.
Officials from the Legal Aid Society and the Empire Justice Center in Albany sent a letter Thursday to the commissioner and top officials at the state Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance (OTDA), asking for help for more than 2,200 clients who have had their benefits stolen in the first eight months of 2022.
Fraudsters “skim” credit and debit card information by secretly installing a device on ATM readers that sends credit card numbers and pin numbers back to the thieves, the letter states.
With that data, they create fake cards and drain accounts.
People don’t know they’ve been victimized until they go to use their cards — and find most or all of their money gone.
“The loss of SNAP and [cash] benefits is having a devastating impact on affected households,” the plaintiffs’ lawyers wrote in the letter, referring to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, often referred to as food stamps.
Most of the theft in the state has happened to people living in New York City, according to state officials — and lawyers with Legal Aid and the New York Legal…
