All posts by Ryan Cullen

Chip and Pin Scam

Chip-and-WoofToday the BBC report about a credit card skimming scam that has been found in Hull.
Now whilst I haven’t blogged about this before I’ve been saying it’s possible since the new machines arrived.

The scam is quite easy.
Step One, get a card reader like the ones at Tescos which is attached to the till screen. These readers are two-in-one it reads both the magnetic strip and the chip.
Step Two, add the classic skimming device to the top of your slider.
Step Three, place a camera or get someone to look at the PIN being entered.
Step Four, clone the card onto a Tesco Clubcard
Step Five, wander into the High Street to an old cash-point (one that won’t read any chips) and enter the PIN you’ve stolen.
Step Six, take the cash and run.

To be truthful this may not work, it’s not exactly like I’ve tried to test it. However there are steps you can take to ensure it never happens to you.

Never let your card out of your hand. With the new chip-and-pin machines only you should need to handle the card. Don’t give it to the till staff at the supermarket, nor give it to the waitress at the restaurant. Make sure you place it in the machine and that you take it out. Chip-and-pin machines are shallow and can’t read the magnetic strip data.
Never let anyone see your PIN. Place your hand over the top and move your body to ensure no-one behind you can see.
Finally if you do spot anything odd on your bank statement phone your bank straight away.

Bloke and Bird split up

A Bloke and A BirdMy morning routine generally involves a quick look at my phone to flick through the overnight emails and a read through the BBC News stories.
This allows me to work out if there might be anything exciting on the morning news.
At 7am today, it looked like the headlines would most likely be about the Bourbon Dolphin, so I stayed in bed for a bit.
Getting down for about 7.45 I put on BBC Breakfast and watched Newswatch. It was then followed by the headlines. The top story, Young Unmarried Couple Split Up, looking at my phone, I was sent the story via Breaking News by 7.15.
If that wasn’t bad enough I went to the gym which had the same story on loop.
Finally getting home I put on Radio 4 and listened again to the Now Show. Then proper news came on, none of this magazine style BBC One type news. But guess what was the top story, 47 dead in Iraq? Nope, that couple again.
Please BBC, if I see this as the lead story by 22.10 tonight I want my license fee back!

Parking charges up by 1000%!

Parking SignToday’s papers and Direct Line would want you to believe that the cost of parking your car has soared. Citing Berkhamstead as an example, where on average parking for two hours will now cost you a whole £1.08 (was 10p). If anybody really believes that £1.08 is an extortionate price for car parking they haven’t been to London.
Worse is the panic that the overall average has gone up from 86p to £1.21 in six years. A price rise of about 6p per year. 6p!!!!!!!
It reminds me of the people moaning about the recent rise for the Dunham Bridge toll. This year saw a 20% increase, which to cars was 5p. Now unless those opposing price increases want a yearly inflationary increase of 1 and 2p and are willing to have a stack of coppers, a 5p rise after four years ain’t bad.

Panic! Name not on list of candidates!

A small panic yesterday. I started to play about with Live Local plotting the 12 candidates for Park Ward, when a colleague asked where were I? Only at this point (about an hour after printing out the list) that I realised my name wasn’t there.
A quick email to the deputy returning officer and a reply within minutes apologised for the error, pointed out that they had already spotted it and were just uploading the new list.
Phew!

May Elections

Well the papers are in and have been verified, and assuming I don’t pull out I’ll be facing re-election for Park Ward this May. Due to us having boundary changes I only got one year as being a councillor, and there is the possibility that if I get the 3rd largest vote I’ll be up again next year! Good luck to all the other LibDems from across the country, including my better half Heather Quinton, who will be joining me in defending Park with our good friend Stephen Morgan.

Libdems and Goldfish

GoldfishA quick search on Google shows a lot of results for Libdems Goldfish, mostly linking to people commenting on blogs about a policy passed back in 2003 (I believe).
More suprising was that these comments are still apearing, even after the Pet welfare act was passed, and today becomes law.

Under the act the minimum age for buying a pet will rise from 12 to 16 and under-16s will not be allowed to win a pet as a prize.

Which was what we were saying all along, wasn’t it?