The message on the internet about safeguarding your money if you forced to make a withdrawal has been on the internet for a long time. It’s like an urban legend that everyone has heard of but no one has seen (in this case) used it actually. It is just like the myth of a Golem!
The message has gone viral on the internet several times with different words but same in essence:
Messages spread
PIN NUMBER REVERSAL
If you should ever be forced by a robber to withdraw money from an ATM machine, you can notify the police by entering your PIN # in reverse.
For example if your pin number is 1234 then you would put in 4321.
The ATM recognizes that your pin number is backward from the ATM card you placed in the machine
The machine will still give you the money you requested, but unknown to the robber, the police will be immediately dispatched to help you.This information was recently broadcast on CTV and it states that it is seldom used because people don’t know it exists.
I checked with my Bank of Nova Scotia to see if this was correct and staff said yes this information is correct.
Please pass this along to everyone possible.
The idea is that entering your PIN number in reverse order will send a silent electronic alert to the police and a team will be deployed immediately to the ATM.
FACT CHECK : FAKE
Clarification
According to the reports from the Federal Trade Commission, the technology is either unavailable or under development A snippet from the report of the FTC from April 2010 says:
FTC staff learned that emergency-PIN
technologies have never been deployed at any ATMs. The respondent banks reported
that none of their ATMs currently have installed, or have ever had installed,
an emergency-PIN system of any sort.
Even if it was implemented, Some people may have reversible PINs such as 7777 or 2442 then these palindromic PINs would be unavailable for the reason of avoiding false call outs. Even, PINs which are semi reversible such as 7677 or 1541 , would also be avoided as well so that accidental alarms would not be triggered by mistake.
However; a patent was filed by a lawyer named Joseph Zingher from Illinois who invented the reverse PIN system to alert the police. The system is called ATM Safety Pin Software and has not been implemented to date.
So , When in Emergency , Use your Senses and be Alert - Rather than Trying to Enter Reverse PIN in ATM.