Skimming equipment, both software and hardware, has been freely available for ages now. And it's quite simple. Anybody who knows how to use ebay and write a small application can create quite sophisticated skimming equipment themselves.
The problem is not the availability of the equipment or the know-how. The problem is what "average Joe" is used to. If "average Joe" would balk when presented an off the shelf mobile phone to swipe their card through, well, then skimming using a mobile phone would be hard. But if the banks and payment processors have trained "average Joe" to know that a mobile phone is a completely legit way of reading credit cards, well then this type of skimming is easy.
If no ATMs existed, well, then it would be really hard to skim cards using an ATM-like device, because people would balk.
It's all about keeping the different legit ways of accepting credit card payment to a minimum. The fewer legit ways, the fewer possibilities of skimming.
On the other hand, there is no doubt in my mind that mobile payment will be the future. Replacing the standard plastic will a chip in your mobile phone will become commonplace soon, and we will also probably see applications where you can transfer money to others simply by having both mobile phones interact.
So the question is if the big fuss really helps anyone, or if it's only delaying the inevitable.