SCHNUCK’S MASSIVE DATA BREACH RESULTS IN SEVERAL CLASS ACTION LAWSUITS

       As we reported last month, Schnucks super market stores announced a data breach in March that potentially effected 2.4 million debit and credit card users.  News reports have indicated that as many as 79 Schnucks stores may have had their customers’ card numbers and information stolen.  As is often the case, class action lawsuits have … Continue reading

Credit/Debit Card Breach at Barnes & Noble Exposes Holes in Point of Sale Systems

Hackers gained access to credit card information from customers at 63 Barnes & Noble stores.  Although the incident was first discovered in September, the FBI requested that Barnes & Noble delay publicly reporting the incident so as not to impede the investigation. Somehow, and the exact methodology has not been revealed, hackers were able to capture information from PIN … Continue reading

Credit Card Transactions: A Data Breach Waiting to Happen

Last week, Global Payments, Inc., an electronic transactions processor for, among others, VISA and MasterCard, reported a large data breach.    According to Global Payments, intruders obtained ”track 2″ credit card data on 1.5 million cardholders. Track 2 refers to a portion of the data contained on the credit card’s magnetic stripe [pdf].  Track 2 data includes card numbers and expiration dates.  Track 1 data, which was not … Continue reading

PCI Security Standards Council Releases Guidelines for Virtual Environments

On June 14, the PCI Security Standards Council released new guidelines [pdf] directed to entities that  process payment card data in virtual environments.  These guidelines do not add additional requirements to the PCI-DSS 2.0 standard.  Rather,  they are  an outline for applying the existing standard in the context of virtual platforms, including cloud computing. In … Continue reading