Card skimmers at a supermarket chain – Inside job?

From the Mercury News (via ars technica):

“Further evaluation uncovered an extra computer board that had been placed inside the checkout machine, recording customers' financial information.”

So…how did a skimmer get inside the checkout machine?

How not to disburse financial aid

Years Decades ago I worked for a small college with strong, forward looking leadership that firmly believed a significant fraction of our interactions with students should be computerized. He believed that if we automated background bureaucracy we could better handle the budgets cuts and shift more resources into classrooms. He also believed that if students had a clear, consistent interface into our bureaucracy they’d be better, happier learners.

My job was to make that happen.

Car goes over cliff, undetected

A car goes over the edge of a cliff on a narrow mountain road. The driver survives, but the accident goes undetected for six days. After five days, the family files a missing persons report. Law enforcement tells them that follow up will take days. The family doesn’t wait. They locate the car using their own means with the help of a detective and the phone company, including what appears to be one of the controversial warrantless cell phone locates that law enforcement does millions of times per year.