ATM Security: The Real Match Is Played on Information Sharing
At the WeSec Security Expo in Milan, on 22 and 23 September 2026, Italia Informa interviewed Domenico Morano, Sole Director of MCM Group. Three questions on the state of ATM security in Italy.
Attacks on ATMs are growing again. What are the most dangerous techniques today, and how vulnerable are Italian ATMs really?
Unfortunately, you are right: attacks keep growing, and attack techniques keep evolving, keep changing. I would call it organised crime proper — highly structured, capable of analysing ATMs and of analysing the solutions we manufacturers put forward. There is data that bears this growth out.
In some contexts, however, the trend is changing. That is the case with Poste Italiane, which since 2024 has launched a series of countermeasures, purchasing our solutions among others — solutions that secure the ATM and act as a deterrent, especially visually: you can tell that a given machine is fitted with a certain device, and that also diverts attention — it is unpleasant to say — towards other ATMs.
ATM protection technology keeps evolving, but so does crime. In this race, who is one step ahead today: the attackers or the defenders?
It is a race, genuinely a race: a constant chase. Right now we are certainly ahead. We are ahead because we started behind: in 2024 we began to run.
The effectiveness of these actions does not depend on us alone — and by "us" I mean every category of company that develops solutions. The important thing, as I said in our session, is collaboration with banking institutions and with postal institutions.
In concrete terms, what does it take to stay one step ahead?
Understanding the attack techniques. The institutions must always allow us — I said as much to the Carabinieri colonel — to understand what the attack techniques are, because that is where we can try to catch up.
And then that information has to be shared. Criminals share it from Calabria to Puglia, to Lombardy, to Veneto, at a speed that is genuinely striking. We ought to be just as good at it — everyone in the sector who develops solutions, the ATM manufacturers, but also the banking and postal institutions — at pooling this information.
That is where the real match is played. That is where you can be one step ahead.
Watch the full interview: Italia Informa interviews Domenico Morano — WeSec 2026