40 Million Credit Card Numbers Stolen [maybe]

[Ivan Seeking]

An "unauthorized individual" infiltrated the computer network of a third-party payment processor and may have stolen up to 40 million credit card numbers, MasterCard International revealed Friday. All brands of credit cards were exposed in the attack; about 14 million of the 40 million accounts exposed were MasterCard accounts, the firm said. [continued]

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/8260050/

 

[theCandyman]

Wow, better look out for any new billionaires in town.

 

[Astronuc]

Make my day why don't you!

Can you trust Mastercard?

NEW YORK - A security breach of customer information at a credit card transaction company could expose to fraud up to 40 million cardholders of multiple brands, MasterCard International Inc. said Friday.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050618/ap_on_bi_ge/credit_cards_breach

And I got a whole bunch of phish today claiming to be eBay safe support!

 

[Moonbear]

I'm actually less worried about a stolen credit card number than identity theft. I've had someone use a credit card number of mine before for a rather grandiose vacation in France (or at least the price tag was grandiose). The credit card company flagged the charges and deactivated the card before I even knew there was a problem yet (I found out when I called to find out why my card wasn't working). Of course, since all the charges were in a foreign country, it was easy to prove it wasn't me, but they never even required I prove it since it was clearly a huge deviation from my usual spending patterns. I just had to fill out a bunch of paperwork, and it took a few months to catch all the charges as they trickled in, then reverse the interest fees that automatically added on when I didn't pay those charges, but they were always easy to work with and I just needed to make one call each month when each new statement came into inform them of the charges that were still appearing, etc.

Since I have very regular spending patterns, it's easy to flag unusual activity on my accounts.

 

[Evo]

I'm actually less worried about a stolen credit card number than identity theft. I've had someone use a credit card number of mine before for a rather grandiose vacation in France (or at least the price tag was grandiose). The credit card company flagged the charges and deactivated the card before I even knew there was a problem yet (I found out when I called to find out why my card wasn't working). Of course, since all the charges were in a foreign country, it was easy to prove it wasn't me, but they never even required I prove it since it was clearly a huge deviation from my usual spending patterns. I just had to fill out a bunch of paperwork, and it took a few months to catch all the charges as they trickled in, then reverse the interest fees that automatically added on when I didn't pay those charges, but they were always easy to work with and I just needed to make one call each month when each new statement came into inform them of the charges that were still appearing, etc.

Since I have very regular spending patterns, it's easy to flag unusual activity on my accounts.

I'm sorry, I didn't know they would deactivate your card. I just needed a vacation.

 

[dduardo]

Evidently these companies don't know what encryption is.

Also, I was going through some old reciepts and noticed that a bunch of companies, like pizza hut, print your full credit card number, expiration and name on the reciept. This really worries me because I'm sure if you go through their garbage you'll find a boat load of credit card numbers.

 

[Evo]

Evidently these companies don't know what encryption is.

Also, I was going through some old reciepts and noticed that a bunch of companies, like pizza hut, print your full credit card number, expiration and name on the reciept. This really worries me because I'm sure if you go through their garbage you'll find a boat load of credit card numbers.

I never check my credit card statements closely anymore and I should. My friend in Italy recently found an online purchase of software from Sweden made on his account. Of course the credit card company dismissed the charge and issued him a new card. My charge purchases can get quite large at times and I don't look over every line, I should.

 

[loseyourname]

They can have my credit card numbers. They'll be declined every time they attempt to make a purchase.

 

[Physics is Phun]

and just how is that, loseyourname?