Police hunting hi-tech thieves plundering North-East bank accounts have announced a major breakthrough.

Detectives say bank account holders across the region have lost money to the fake cash machine scam, the latest in Redcar, Hartlepool and Darlington.

Cleveland Police yesterday claimed " a major setback'' for the thieves following the recovery of a fake front for a cash machine, complete with micro computer, in Guisborough.

Several people have fallen victim in Hartlepool, where one person's account was completely emptied. And other cases have been reported in County Durham and in Northumberland.

The banking industry's own intelligence service suggests that the gangs harvesting millions from accounts across the length of the UK are from eastern Europe.

Cleveland Police yesterday showed off the piece of electronic equipment recovered from a Guisborough bank - the first to be retrieved in the North-East. It was retrieved complete with a mini computer used to record card details.

It became dislodged in the hands of an inquisitive customer. It is thought watching thieves moved in swiftly to retrieve a micro camera which would also have been attached to the ATM to film numbers as they were typed in.

Detective Sergeant Dawn Naughton of Cleveland Police Fraud Squad described the trend as worrying.

The fake ATM housings are an exact colour match with the real machine, and precise in the detail of a bank's logo and typeface.

"If you do not know what you are looking for it is difficult to detect,'' she told The Northern Echo. "We believe when these machines are in use the gang operating them keep a close eye on what is going on. They need a micro camera to record pin numbers and that would be constantly monitored from nearby.

"The sophisticated computer we have retrieved downloads all the card details and literally reveals the customer's banking details.

"The criminals download the information onto a blank card and once they have a pin number they can raid customer accounts at will. The scale of such frauds nation wide is staggering.''

Det Sgt Naughton appealed to anyone finding a false moulding glued over the front of on an ATM machine not to remove it, "because we will need it for forensic and DNA testing.''

She advises people using ATMs to use one hand to shield the other when punching a pin number into the machine.