Card Skimming crime
What TornLife's research has established about Card Skimming crime, and the questions players asked about it.
What TornLife has verified
- Card Skimming was released as the sixth Crimes 2.0 crime on 2023-08-29 (announced as releasing ahead of the fifth crime). The crime involves installing a skimmer that slowly collects card details from ATM users, then recovering the skimmer at a time of the player's choosing to collect and sell the details. (confirmed by Torn; Crimes 2.0 : Card Skimming, )
- Installing a skimmer requires a Card Skimmer item (to capture card info) and a Spy Camera item (to observe the PIN). Spy Cameras are bought from the Super Store; Card Skimmers are commonly obtained from the Search For Cash crime, while travelling in Mexico, the city dump, or NPC bazaars. Both items are returned to the player on a successful recovery of the skimmer. (confirmed by Torn; Crimes 2.0 : Card Skimming, )
- Once attached to an ATM, a skimmer can be monitored remotely, but it will occasionally be lost, broken, or discovered by authorities; this chance increases the longer the skimmer has been active. If this happens, the Card Skimmer, Spy Camera and all accumulated card details for that skimmer are lost. (confirmed by Torn; Crimes 2.0 : Card Skimming, )
- A staff member restored 4,196 card details for a player whose sell card details action failed to pay out and incorrectly removed the stock during a server downtime incident in September 2025. (confirmed by Torn; Card Skimming - Card Details Collected Reset, )
- Selling more card details at once can result in a higher price per card, which is the core mechanical reason to delay cashing out and accumulate a larger batch before selling. (confirmed by Torn; Crimes 2.0 : Card Skimming, )
- A critical failure on the sell card details action results in losing some of the stored card details (one documented case lost 2 card details out of roughly 1,200 held, due to a logging mismatch bug) and sends the player to jail (one case for 3h 16m). (confirmed by Torn; Card Skimming Critical removed all cards, )
- Installing a skimmer costs 6 nerve; recovering it costs 4 nerve. (documented; Card Skimming log lacks information, )
- An honor bar is awarded for reaching level 100 in Card Skimming, and another for successfully recovering a single skimmer that has accumulated at least 250 card details. (confirmed by Torn; Crimes 2.0 : Card Skimming, )
- Players report repeated difficulty succeeding at the crime overall, including being jailed multiple times in a row and uncertainty about whether the crime ever goes smoothly, reflecting ongoing player frustration with install/recovery failure rates rather than a documented fixed success chance. (player reports; Card skimming, )
- The wiki documents that 'Sell Card Details' is a six nerve subcrime that sells all stored card details in a single attempt, and that pay is based on how many details are sold at once: selling more at once yields a higher average pay per detail, with price per detail ranging between $100 and $250. (documented; Card Skimming › Sell Card Details, )
- Selling card details requires a Personal Computer, Laptop or Gold Laptop in addition to having card details stored. (documented; Card Skimming › Sell Card Details, )
- Staff clarified that a discovered skimmer stays visible on the Crimes page for 12 hours after the player sees the discovery notification (or after viewing the hub page triggers this), then is removed; a skimmer with accumulated details that disappears without a visible discovery event has, per staff, already been discovered and removed. (confirmed by Torn; Crimes 2.0 - Card Skimming, )
- A player reported that card details do not reaccumulate instantly after a sell: staff confirmed that after selling, a player had not regrown their stock past 10,000 details within 6 days, debunking a claim of an unexplained loss of a 10,000+ detail stockpile. (confirmed by Torn; Card skimming bug, )
- Card Skimmer (item ID 1125) can be bought in Mexico for a listed buy price of $175 (market value $2,104 as of capture) or found via city find, or obtained as a drop from Search For Cash subcrimes (Search the Trash, Search the Subway, Search the Junkyard), Graffiti's Financial District, and Burglary of Commercial Targets, in listed quantities. (documented; Card Skimmer, )
- Spy Camera can be bought from the Super Store for $130 or found as a city find, or obtained as a drop from Search For Cash (Search the Junkyard), Shoplifting (Super Store), and Burglary of Residential/Commercial/Industrial targets, in listed quantities. (documented; Spy Camera › Obtaining, )
Questions about Card Skimming crime
- How does the Card Skimming crime work, and when is the best time to cash out the card details you obtain from it?
Card Skimming is install → accumulate → recover → sell: install costs 6 nerve (needs a Card Skimmer + Spy Camera), recovery costs 4 nerve per an acti…
Crimes ·