Two metro Atlanta men accused of hacking a bank ATM in Dalton by planting a “skimmer” on it have been arrested in Tennessee, police said Wednesday.
Atanas G. Georgiev and Chris Svetlinov Dragiev were arrested Tuesday afternoon after another bank card skimmer device was placed on a Regions Bank ATM in the Nashville area, according to Bruce Frazier, spokesman for the Dalton Police Department.
“We have taken warrants on them for identity theft, and possibly there will be other agencies (with charges) as well,” Frazier told the AJC in a phone interview.
Georgiev, 28, of the 8100 block of Brookwood Valley Circle, Atlanta, and Dragiev, 27, of the 4500 block of Kings Crossing Drive, Kennesaw, are suspected of planting a skimmer Thursday evening on a Regions Bank ATM at Walnut Avenue and Tibbs Road in Dalton, police said.
Placed over a card reader slot, the skimmer was capable of recording the account information and passwords of ATM customers. A bank employee discovered the device Friday morning after it set off an ATM alarm.
Georgiev and Dragiev also are suspected in two skimmer incidents in Tennessee, in Nashville and in East Ridge, just outside Chattanooga, Frazier said.
Regions Bank security detected the pair at an ATM on Dickerson Pike in the Nashville area Tuesday afternoon, Frazier said. Investigators checked video feeds from other ATMs nearby and saw the suspects allegedly covering an ATM camera with a sticky note at about 4:30 p.m.
The Metro Nashville Police Department was alerted, and officers pulled over the suspects’ silver Volkswagen Touareg near Opryland shortly afterward.
The men also had keys to an Audi, Frazier said. Dalton police have been looking for a red Audi, shown in a bank surveillance video from that city. The Audi has yet not been recovered.
Frazier said that in the Dalton incident, the skimmer was discovered and removed before the suspects had a chance to retrieve it. It’s not yet known if the device had wireless capability, so it’s uncertain if the suspects were able to get customers’ data off of it.
“People should keep an eye on their accounts to make sure nothing fraudulent has happened to them, but we feel that nobody from our bank in Dalton was compromised,” Frazier said.
As for the skimmer itself, “this one is pretty sophisticated; not only does it read the magnetic strip (of a customer’s bank card), but it has a camera to read the keypad,” Frazier said.
He could not say how the suspects got hold of the device, but said police have no reason to believe they could be part of a larger criminal ring.
About the Author
