My husband and I spent 3 weeks in Peru in June - 10 days in Cusco-Sacred Valley-Machu Pichu and a week long Amazon cruise with International Expeditions. We had a great time and recommend both our Cusco-area guide, David Choque, and IE cruise.

BUT - we got home to find that our debit card info had been stolen and was being used to get money in Brazil. Fortunately our bank was alert and canceled the card before large withdrawals were attempted.

We only used the card in 2 places - an ATM machine in Urubamba (across the street from El Maizel restaurant), and a machine on the Plaza in Cusco: Porto Commercial 133. Next time we will be very careful to only use a machine inside a bank building.

I've gotten lots of help and ideas from Fodorites, and hope this will help someone else.

Are you sure you never used it to charge a dinner or a hotel? It seems more likely to be cloned that way. It is possible to add a connection to an atm to read cards but there would have been an odd attachment in the card slot.

Nope, never used it except as stated - I was very careful about that.

We spent a couple of months in the Sacred Valley living in a friends bungalow in Urumbamba for most of the time and frequently used the ATM in Urumbamba you mentioned and many machines around the plaza in Cusco and encountered no problems at all. I guess you were just unlucky but I am not sure using machines inside will be any more secure. The banks do seem to be very alert for card fraud in Peru. Our bank (HSBC) were forever blocking our cards if we tried to use them more than once a day anywhere in Peru, necessitating a call to the bank each time. It was a real pain because the local withdrawal limits were quite low but in view of your experience I guess it was a sensible precaution.

Thanks for posting use of DC's very risky

I never bring/use a debit card linked to a main account in SA

You can lose everything to a good thief

easy for them to get your # PIN while you are using ATM

usually go with no fee Capital One Visa CC

no liability linked to no account.

Good point re not using a card linked to a main account. I am now using one of the new pre-loaded fx cards and topping up as and when needed - much better fx rates and fees are an added bonus

http://www.fairfx.com/

Thanks for your comments. I'm going to investigate using a non-debit card for ATMs when I travel.

I used the Global Net Atms which are widespread thruout Peru and ATMs attached to a bank. No problems at all. I just kept a reasonably small amount of cash in the attached checking account and if it needed replenishing I could transfer funds from a linked account.

I would not use a credit card that charges a cash advance fee for withdrawals. Very expensive.

What kind of ATMs where these if not bank-affiliated?

I was in Peru last year and this happened to 4 people in my group. They had used an ATM somewhere in Peru, then about a month later their accounts were accessed from either Peru or Brazil. We did not even go to Brazil on this trip. I had used several of the same ATMs they used so I decided to be pro-active. I called my bank and cancelled my card immediately, for fear my account would be drained too.

The good news is the other people did get their money back in just a few days. While this can happen anywhere in the world, I've heard too many stories of it happening in Peru.

PA Kathy, if a non-debit card works then that's great, but take your debit card along also. When I was in Belgium I had just an ATM card and I discovered too late that in some countries (Belgium included) the non-debit ATM card does not work. I tried at least 5 different machines before someone told me, so I ended up exchanging US cash for a crummy rate.

mlgb - I think the ATMs were bank affiliated - just not inside a bank building. Don't know if being inside would make the machines harder to tamper with.

P_M - thanks for the alert re ATM cards in Belgium. I'm headed to Ireland in Sept, so will have to resolve this issue for my trip.