Question: How Big a Bag Do I Need? On November 8, 2008, within a 30-minute period, dozens of criminal "cashers" in the United States, Hong Kong, and Russia withdrew $9M from approximately 130 ATMs at convenience stores and other locations in 49 cities as they executed a worldwide scam of RBS, World Pay, Inc. (RBS). The cashers are assumed to have made repeated rapid-fire withdrawals using 100 ATM cards, and then walked away with the cash. RSB is the U.S based payment processing branch of the Royal Bank of Scotland. RSB issues payroll cards. Payrolls cards are like debit cards, and they can be used by companies to pay salaries to people who do not have bank accounts, for example. These individuals redeem their salary by withdrawing cash from an ATM. The crime is one of the first times computer hackers altered information inside a company's "accounting" records to commit a financial crime.
Hackers usually attack a website to steal proprietary information such as credit card numbers, for example. To commit this crime, cybercriminals made a final penetration of RBS's computer system in Scotland prior to November 8. The purpose of the attack was to obtain unencrypted PIN numbers, eliminate or substantially raise the withdrawal limits on specific payroll cards, and later use this information to counterfeit the magnetic-strip on 100 payroll cards. At the time, when they knew the ATMs would be filled with cash, the cashers attacked the machines.
(a) Assume each casher walked away with $70,000 in cash and that the ATM disperses $20 bills only. Also assume that 100 bills are equal to ½ inch. How big a pile of bills would each casher carry?
(b) Assume the weight of 10,000 bills is 22 lbs. How much weight would each casher carry?
(c) Assume 100 ATMs were robbed in the United States. What is the total weight of the cash accumulated in the United States?
(d) How can this stolen cash be laundered into the banking system?