A £25,000 reward is being offered after scammers targeted two cashpoints in East Lancashire.

Sophisticated card-skimming devices were discovered at Lloyds TSB in Church Street, Clitheroe and another at Barclays Bank, in Church Street, Colne.

The cash reward has been put in place by LINK and Crimestoppers.

It has not been revealed how much money was stolen with the devices.

Graham Mott, senior LINK spokesman, said: “We’re urging the public to come forward with any information that they may have about cash machine crime, for example card skimming or physical attacks on cash machines themselves.

“Even something that may sound insignificant could be part of a bigger picture and prove invaluable in convicting someone involved in cash machine crime.”

It is not thought any information was passed to the criminals from the devices before they were seized by police, but officers said it was impossible to be certain about that.

As well as a card-skimmer, which reads the electronic information from the card, the fraudsters also planted a pin-hole camera above the keypad to record victims tapping in their pin numbers.

Criminals transfer the electronic information to another plastic card and use that and the pin number to withdraw money from their victims’ accounts.

The device was in place between January 6 and 7 in Clitheroe, and was discovered after concerns were raised from the bank.

Police said a similar device was seized on Tuesday, January 11, at Barclays Bank, in Church Street, Colne.

Detective Sergeant Nigel Watson said: “This issue is a big concern because if you go to a cash point you have no way of knowing whether a device has been put in place or not. That is how sophisticated they are.“