NEW ORLEANS — The SIM card inside most cell phones is a tiny digital chip that contains highly sensitive information and, in the wrong hands, can give identity thieves access to everything from passwords to personal identification numbers.
That's exactly what New Orleans Police say Tamber Blackmore, 21, did to 32 customers of the T-Mobile store at 5365 Tchoupitoulas from May 21 to July 11, court records show.
Blackmore, of Marrerro, was arrested Wednesday and booked with 32 counts of identity theft and access device fraud, accused of removing and selling customers’ SIM cards to an unknown associate.
In a police report, detectives wrote that the stolen cards could allow criminals “to ultimately access bank accounts, online wallets and digital currency.”
The detectives wrote that they obtained audio from a telephone call in which Tamber “admitted to committing multiple unauthorized digital SIM card swaps.” The officers noted that “Blackmore further stated that she was not directly committing identity theft with the swapped SIM cards, but was following the direct orders of an unknown subject who was providing payment for her.”
Drew Boudreaux, manager of the UBreakiFix phone repair shop in Metairie, said scammers can do a lot of damage before a victim even realizes their information has been stolen.
“You may not even know that your SIM card and your service is being used from somebody else,” Boudreaux said. “Bank accounts, you can get into pretty much anything you stored on your phone. Nowadays that's their whole life, is on their phone."
Boudreaux said the scheme requires a certain level of sophistication and is rarely seen at a legitimate phone store.
“It does require a certain skill set to do that. And unfortunately, people who do have that skill set do bad things with it,” he said.
A manager at the T-Mobile store declined to comment about the case.
Blackmore was released shortly after her arrest Wednesday on her own recognizance.
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