A COUPLE from the North-East are among thousands of bank customers counting the cost of Britain's fastest growing fraud.

A "skimming" scam, where fraudsters copy card details and use a tiny spy camera to record pin numbers, took £900 from the account of Libby Bell and her partner Val Bargewell, who live near Bishop Auckland, County Durham.

Their details were copied without their realising as they used a cash machine in the town.

Withdrawals of £600 and £300 were made in Tadcaster and Doncaster before they checked their account.

Police removed the sophisticated equipment used in the sting last month and know of another five customers whose accounts were entered.

Detective Inspector Alan Veitch, of Bishop Auckland CID, said: "These devices fool a lot of people. They look exactly like part of the cash machine.

"One way of stopping them is to put your hand over the pin number. If you notice anything different about the machine, report it straight away."

Around the country, cash machine fraud soared by 85 per cent to £61m during the past year.

In the North-East, £633,000 was lost in the 12 months to June, a rise of 36 per cent over the previous year.

However, the Association of Payment Clearing Services said that the majority of cash machines are secure, with £144bn withdrawn safely in 2003.

New chip and PIN technology will also help prevent fraud by including information on a smart chip rather than magnetic strips.

And victims should be compensated by banks as they had not acted negligently.

Barclays said last night they are trialling a new anti-skimming device. If successful, they will be installed in all the bank's machines.

Barnaby Davis, head of ATMS at Barclays, said: "Criminals are getting increasingly sophisticated and we, the industry, need to work extra hard to keep on step ahead."