Credit card data breach could affect 650,000[JC Penney; Others]

AP ^ | 17 Jan 2008 | David Koenig

[BGHater]

GE Money handles credit card operations for J. C. Penney, other retailers

PLANO, Texas - Personal information on about 650,000 customers of J.C. Penney and up to 100 other retailers could be compromised after a computer tape went missing.

GE Money, which handles credit card operations for Penney and many other retailers, said Thursday night that the missing information includes Social Security numbers for about 150,000 people.

The information was on a backup computer tape that was discovered missing last October. It was being stored at a warehouse run by Iron Mountain Inc., a data storage company, and was never checked out but can’t be found either, said Richard C. Jones, a spokesman for GE Money, part of General Electric Capital Corp.

Jones said there was “no indication of theft or anything of that sort,” and no evidence of fraudulent activity on the accounts involved.

Iron Mountain officials didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment. Penney said it had been told of the situation and referred further inquiries to GE Money.

Jones declined to identify the other retailers whose customers’ information is missing but said “it includes many of the large retail organizations.”

[rabscuttle385]

Looks like this primarily affected customers of store-branded credit cards handled by GE Money (additional coverage). Why anyone would carry one of the store cards (they have exorbitant fees and interest rates) is beyond me.

Either way, this kind of situation is an act of negligence on the part of GE Money Bank and the stores involved.

[doc1019]

Lawsuits to follow.

[Candor7]

Should we cancel our JC Penny Cards?

[Graybeard58]

Why anyone would carry one of the store cards (they have exorbitant fees and interest rates) is beyond me.

I have a Lowes and a Menards card. They offer 6 months on purchases over $250 with no interest,(sometimes even a full year), I have bought major appliances at both places and paid them off in under 6 months, . If you do this, be sure to pay within the alloted time or they will go back all the way to the time of purchase and charge you the exorbitant interest.

Also because I have their credit cards they sometimes send me "freebie" coupons.

[singfreedom]

WOW! Only another reason I’m glad I got rid of the few store cards I had. I would be ready to sue “Iron Mountain” and GE Money Bank, both, if I still had any of those cards!

....And some actually wonder where illegal aliens get all those stolen Social Security numbers. The only real question remaining is how much the thieves are charging for them.

[markman46]

anyone got a spare tape reader handy

[ought-six]

If they steal my identity, will they also get my cancer with the deal?

[Roses0508]

Not good for Iron Mountain. We have used and do use them for data protection purposes....

I can come up with several scenarios in which the tape is “lost” but not lost. If they send tapes to Iron Mountain in containers, there could have been a typo in the manifest, or a failure in the scanning. The tape might still be there - or in the trash somewhere. Doesn’t necessarily mean its been stolen, but that is certainly a strong possibility.