Thieves have smashed and grabbed 13 ATMs here in the last several months, pitting the brute force of a car or truck against the perceived imperviousness of a bolted-down cash machine. The thieves either bash a vehicle right through a storefront or into an outdoor ATM kiosk, or wrap a chain around the machine to push or pull it from its bolts so they can haul it off to break into its safe.


The ATM, which celebrates its 40th birthday this year, is the safe du jour, says Rob Evans, director of industry marketing for Dayton, Ohio-based ATM manufacturer NCR Corp. Evans says that as such a ubiquitous presence, unattended cash machines catch the imagination of criminals, and the ATM industry has worked to make the machines bigger and badder to thwart thieves.


Though thieves have had little success getting cash in the recent flurry of ATM strikes in Spokane County, no suspects have been arrested in connection with the crimes, says Spokane Police Department officer Jennifer DeRuwe. She says the incidents have dropped off since late September.


The age-old challenge with keeping anything negotiablecash or other valuablesunattended overnight is making sure its all there in the morning when you come back, Evans says.


At the least, an ATM typically is damaged in such theft attempts, often severely enough that repairs arent cost-effective, Evans says.


A machine owned by Washington Trust Bank, in a kiosk at 4507 W. Wellesley, is one recent example. Though the would-be thieves werent able to get away with the cash or the machine, the ATM was damaged beyond repair in a September attempt, says Amber Albertini, the banks vice president of direct banking.


The property loss amounted to about $30,000, Albertini says. She says Washington Trust uses machines made by several manufacturers, including Diebold Inc. and NCR Corp.


A machine in a bank kiosk typically handles several thousand transactions each month, and bank revenues definitely suffer when a machine goes down, Albertini says.


There is an opportunity cost, she says. If a machine is vandalized, the bank loses potential user fees.


Smaller machines, such as those that convenience store owners often buy and operate themselves, typically cost from $2,000 to $6,000, says Michael Guthrie, owner of Cypress Advantage Properties LLC, a Spokane-based ATM dealer. Cypress sells such machines to small businesses and also contracts with about 70 store owners around the country to operate ATMs for them at their sites, Guthrie says.


ATMs represent a lucrative market for their operators with little overhead, Guthrie asserts. He says his company charges $2.50 to handle a transaction at one of the machines. Its machines can be found in stores and at Spokanes Riverfront Park and at the Spokane County Fairgrounds. A lot of store owners buy their own machines and keep the profits from those transactions. The owner must stock the machines with cash and supply the telephone lines needed for the machines to make the transactions.


Guthrie says that the smaller machines frequently seen in convenience stores and bars are lighter and easier to move if they are ripped from their bolts. Smaller machines, however, typically are loaded with cash daily, and so provide only a limited potential payoff for thieves, who cause much more property damage to the ATM than they net in cash when they rip off the machines.


Evans says ATM smash-and-grabs have been rising nationally, which he contends reflects the worsening state of the economy. When moneys tight, more such crimes occur, he says. Also, the number of ATMs in operation has doubled over the last decade, increasing the sheer number of possible targets, he says.


As the machines are beefed up, criminals adjust their methods accordingly, Evans says. In a rash of such crimes in Phoenix this past summer, thieves used stolen backhoes to snatch ATMs.


NCR and larger financial institutions often employ consultants to do risk assessments of ATM locations, Evans says.


It was pretty easy in Phoenix and Atlanta to look at the high-risk sitesthose within a half-mile of a highway and across from construction, he says.


Albertini says that although Washington Trust hasnt made any policy changes because of rising ATM-related crimes, such problems do enter into decisions on where to locate a machine or whether to keep one operating.


You talk about it, and you do make some determinations. You might say, Oh, gosh, thats the third time thats had vandalism in a year, so it could drive a decision. Do we want to have a machine there? Albertini says.


Washington Trust has opted, for example, not to replace its cash machine at 4507 W. Wellesley. Albertini says the bank had been planning to remove it eventually, so the schedule simply was accelerated after thieves hit the machine.


Guthrie says that when one of his machines got hit twice by ATM thieves after the store where it was located changed its hours, he opted not to replace it.


Both Evans and Guthrie say good placement is a key to security. Guthrie says he counsels his customers to place machines in a stores foot-traffic pattern, but away from doors.


Guthrie also uses an aftermarket ATM alarm system that costs about $400 and sits inside an ATMs safe. The alarm is triggered by motion and light, emitting a 300-decibel sound for up to 10 hours when its set off. Because it usually takes at least 45 minutes for a thief to break into the safe of an ATM, where the money cassette is located, the alarm is an effective deterrent, Guthrie says.


I recommend the alarm, but its the placement (of the ATM) thats crucial, he says.


In cases when a machine must be kept near a window, Guthrie says he advises customers to be vigilant about emptying the machine each night, and even to leave the safe wide open overnight so people can see that its empty.


Evans says some banks use a dye pack that NCR developed, similar to those sometimes placed by banks in bags of cash that are taken during robberies, to track stolen money. The dye stains the bills in the ATMs money cassette if its jostled.


Guthrie says most of his customers dont buy aftermarket devices like the alarm, looking to minimize their investment in the machines, but for the machines Cypress Advantage operates off site, Guthrie says added security is a must in order to buy insurance to cover any losses. He says he buys insurance through an ATM owners association, and gets a 25 percent discount for using added measures such as alarms.


Alarm monitoring services sometimes offer global-positioning-system devices to track machines. Though it can be difficult to get a strong enough signal to use such a device during the active phase of an investigation, the GPS units sometimes are used to recover a machine that has been stolen and dumped elsewhere.


Guthrie says the machines he operates use cellular phone modems, providing a similar tracking capability. He says the cell phone signal the modems emit can be triangulated using cell phone towers to determine a stolen ATMs location. Guthrie installs machines with six-inch bolts and half-inch thick washers, adding protection over the four-inch bolts and thin washers that come from the factory and can be stripped off more easily.


Troy Wunderlich, operational risk manager for Washington Trust, says the bank is always evaluating placement of the machines, but doesnt let smash-and-grab crimes drive where it puts its machines so much as it considers lighting and other security measures.


Evans says the sheer bulk of ATMs has increased over the years, making them physically more difficult to move. Guthrie has a stack of free weights he installs in some machines to make them even heavier.


Guthrie says every ATM owner who gets hit by a smash-and-grab learns something from the crime.


He says a customer came to see me the day after her machine was stolen and said, I need a new machine, Guthrie says. She doesnt have it by the window anymore.


Contact Jeanne Gustafson at (509) 344-1264 or via e-mail at jeanneg@spokanejournal.com.