At the invitation of Representative Kellie Deeter (R-Norwalk), several legal aid attorneys recently gave testimony to the Ohio House Agriculture Committee on House Bill 163, sponsored by Deeter and Representative Tristan Rader (D-Lakewood). The bill would leverage federal dollars to enable SNAP EBT cards with chip technology to protect critical funds that Ohioans need to pay for groceries. If passed, the new law would be known as the Enhanced Cybersecurity for SNAP Act of 2025. 

In recent years, many individuals who rely on SNAP benefits to feed themselves and their families have been victims of electronic skimming fraud. “Skimmers” hide a device on card-swiping machines at check-out counters to capture card information. After capturing the data, they use the funds on the card, typically in a few quick online transactions initiated out of state. 

“For many individuals, this fraud occurs in the first few days after benefits were loaded, leaving them without benefits until the next month,” Policy Advocate Danielle DeLeon Spires of the Ohio Poverty Law Center said during her May 28 testimony to the Ohio House Agricultural Committee.

As anyone who has ever had unauthorized charges appear on their credit card knows, the cardholder rarely loses money because of fraudulent use of their card information. The Fair Credit Billing Act limits the consumers’ liability for unauthorized charges to $50, and most credit cards have zero-liability policies, which further assure cardholders they will not be responsible for any unauthorized charges. Unauthorized charges are typically removed as soon as they are reported, and since the banks and vendors absorb the cost of credit card fraud, credit card companies are motivated to temporarily deactivate a card if they notice an atypical pattern of charges. 

The same is not true for SNAP electronic benefit cardholders. 

As of early March 2025, skimmers had taken SNAP funds from over 31,000 Ohioans at an estimated cost of $17 million dollars. From mid-2023 through December 2024, victims of SNAP skimming could apply to the federal government for reimbursement funds, which took time to process and required families to rely on food pantries and other local safety net resources while waiting for funds to be restored. Since Congress did not extend the SNAP skimming reimbursement funding beyond 2024, now a victim of SNAP benefit theft has no path to recover those critical funds. Once they are stolen, they are gone. 

Enabling all SNAP EBT cards with chip technology would greatly reduce the risk of SNAP skimming and keep tax dollars in the hands of those who need them to feed their families rather than cybercriminals who are defrauding the system. And while there is an upfront cost to administering the change, the USDA reimburses 50% of a state’s implementation expenses. 

Without chip security, many Ohioans continue to experience the loss of SNAP benefits and the cascade of compounding challenges that follow. 

Attorney Deborah K. Dallmann of The Legal Aid Society of Cleveland testified about many constituents who have come to legal aid seeking help recovering stolen SNAP funds.  

• A 72-year-old gentleman living only on Social Security called Cleveland Legal Aid asking why his SNAP card had a zero balance and showed purchases in New York when he had never been to New York.  
• A 74-year-old woman lost the $460 in unduly withheld SNAP benefits that had just been restored to her account. 
• A veteran living on only $1,300 a month in VA service-connected benefits, paying almost half of that for rent, had his $158 in SNAP stolen. 
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Paralegal Patrina Queen of Legal Aid of Southeast and Central Ohio who serves Ohioans from rural Appalachian counties told legislators about the hardships constituents face when their SNAP benefits get skimmed: 

• A young mother worried she would be evicted because she had to use rent money for food while she waited for replacement SNAP benefits. (And now those replacement benefits are no longer available.) 
• A homeless veteran who was ill and in and out of the hospital was unable to connect with ODJFA when his benefits were skimmed. 
• A single, disabled individual whose multiple health conditions require her to maintain strict dietary restrictions was devastated to find a zero balance on her card at the beginning of the month.  
• When a mother of five, who described how carefully she shopped to make her SNAP benefits last through the month, had her benefits stolen, her ex filed for emergency custody of the children. 
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To date, most attempts to solve the SNAP skimming problem have all required protective action by the SNAP recipient, with little responsibility taken for theft prevention by ODJFS. SNAP participants are advised to change their PINs frequently and use an app to lock their card, waiting until they get to the checkout counter to unlock. Queen told of constituents in rural counties who do not use the app to lock their SNAP card because there is not always a phone signal or internet connection at the stores where they shop, and they don’t want to risk not being able to pay because they can’t unlock their SNAP card. 

In her testimony to the House Agriculture Committee, Attorney Regina Campbell of the Legal Aid Society of Greater Cincinnati, explained why protective measures on the part of the recipient aren’t enough. 

“We have developed education materials to show people how to lock their EBT card by using the Conduent app,” Campbell wrote, “however, this process is difficult and time consuming for many. They must be tech savvy enough to understand how to use the app, and have the technology available to access the app. Many of our clients have smart phones, but many do not. Many understand how to use the app to lock their card, but many do not. And if the card is locked, and somehow the person does not have access to data or Wi-Fi when they need to unlock the card, they are left without use of their benefits. At best it’s an imperfect solution to a very straightforward issue – Ohio's EBT cards do not contain the technology necessary to protect SNAP benefits.”