Push for mandatory reverse ATM PIN adoption rears its head, again

 

The appeal for a reverse ATM code has again popped up in mainstream press, this time in Illinois, where the (Peoria, Ill.) Journal Star last week reported about a technology that has been discussed in the industry for several years, yet fails to take off.

Joseph Zingher, a former lawyer and resident of Rushville, Ill., who developed the reverse-PIN software, is again pushing the technology as a way to curb crime. He told the Journal Star that he hopes the Illinois General Assembly will act this year to make his solution mandatory statewide.
 
"Every day, I get a Google news update searching for the words ATM and murder," Zingher told the paper, noting that in nearly every case, the victim's four-digit code was a factor. "If there was any chance that they would have been calling police, those murders would not have happened."
 
Currently, Senate Bill 1355, which would take Zingher's idea and make it law, is pending in the Financial Institutions committee.
 
A similar bill was proposed a few years back in Illinois, but was modified to make the mandatory provision voluntary — a request made on behalf of the banking industry.
 
Debbie Jemison, a spokeswoman for the Illinois Bankers Association, told the Journal Star her organization opposes SB 1355 because of safety concerns for potential victims. Jemison says it would be difficult for a person to remember her PIN backwards, thus tipping off the robber that something might be amiss.
 
The banking industry seems to prefer to keep it voluntary.
 
No banks in Illinois currently use the reverse-ATM PIN program.