PHILADELPHIA - Police are warning shoppers of an ongoing gift card scam known as "card draining" that recently impacted over 100 gift cards at a Pennsylvania grocery store.
The scam, according to police, involves thieves removing a gift card from store shelves and carefully procuring the card's information before returning it to the rack.
When a victim unknowingly purchases a compromised gift card, police say the thieves use the stolen card number and pin-codes to drain the card's value.
University of San Diego Finance Professor, Dan Roccato, had this to say about the scammers, "They’re looking at gift card purchases and basically stealing the numbers before the consumer buys the card."
The New Britain Township Police department reported over 100 Visa Vanilla and Apple gift cards were recently compromised at a local Giant grocery store.