Dozens of credit unions around the country have been working to identify member accounts that may be threatened from the huge security breach at CardSystems Solutions and many have started to recall and replace affected accounts.
Boeing Employees CU sent letters to 48,000 debit and credit cardholders whose account information was among the stolen. Oregon Community CU notified more than 7,000 of its members last week; and Watermark CU sent letters to 4,500 cardholders.
In Fort Wayne, Ind., Professional Federal Credit Union said it reissued approximately 600 VISA credit and debit cards for members whose account information might have been among the data stolen. The credit union said it notified members and replaced the cards, although it had no evidence of any fraud involving those accounts.
Similarly, in Atlanta, Associated Credit Union reissued 3,000 Visa-branded credit and debit cards, again as a precaution.
In the CardSystems Solutions breach, as many as 40 million credit card accounts may have been breached, according the company, which processes credit and debit card payments. Included in the data at risk is 13.9 million MasterCard account numbers. MasterCard reported that approximately 68,000 of those cardholders are at what it called "high risk for fraud."
John Annaloro, president of the Washington CU League, said last week as many as 100,000 members in the northwest may have had their account information stolen from the third-party processor of Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Discover cards, but no one knows yet how many of the accounts have actually been penetrated. Other credit unions from around the country began notifying members as well: Harlingen Area Teachers CU and Boeing Wichita CU.
