NYC Transit revealed why the Metrocard vending machines were so screwed on Monday and Tuesday: An encryption device wasn't working! The NY Times explains usually 2 devices "[encode] transmitted data for customer and bank security and [are] housed at a data center on Staten Island," but when one failed, the other couldn't deal with the demand. When the broken device was discovered--and replaced--the problem stopped. The agency says that everyone whose credit/debit cards were charged during "unable to be processed" transactions have been (will be?) refunded.