Perhaps hoping the bad news would get buried in presidential inauguration mania, Heartland Payment Systems yesterday announced the discovery of a piece of malicious software buried in their processing system. The malware gave somebody (or something?) access to credit card numbers moving through Heartland’s network. Potentially millions of credit card users are affected, because Heartland supplies credit card processing to roughly 250,000 businesses across the United States.
The company made its announcement on a special website designed just for the occasion, called 2008 Breach. Though personal data seems unaffected, the people who created the malware and put it on Heartland’s network may have been snarfing up millions of legit credit card numbers.
Another day, another datapocalypse.
Security expert Adam O’Donnell has the full story at Zero Day.
