Besides watching for interest rate increases, credit limit reductions, and unfair billing practices, consumers have yet another reason to keep an eye on their credit card accounts– a data breach associated with payment processor Heartland Data Systems. The data breach, which according to the Princeton, NJ based company occurred sometime last year, may have compromised tens of millions of credit and debit card transactions.

According to a recent article in the Washington Post, the payment processor breach may be the largest ever :

Robert Baldwin, Heartland’s president and chief financial officer, said the company, which processes payments for more than 250,000 businesses, began receiving fraudulent activity reports late last year from MasterCard and Visa on cards that had all been used at merchants which rely on Heartland to process payments.

The company stressed that no merchant data or cardholder Social Security numbers, unencrypted personal identification numbers (PIN), addresses or telephone numbers were jeopardized as a result of the breach.

The data stolen includes the digital information encoded onto the magnetic stripe built into the backs of credit and debit cards. Armed with this data, thieves can fashion counterfeit credit cards by imprinting the same stolen information onto fabricated cards.

Heartland believes that the intrusion is contained and that this incident may be the result of a widespread global cyber fraud operation, and are working closely with the United States Secret Service and Department of Justice to identify and resolve the issue.

The company is advising cardholders to examine their monthly statements closely and report any suspicious activity to their card issuers. Cardholders are not responsible for unauthorized fraudulent charges made by third parties.

For more information, the company has created a website to provide communication to the public regarding the breach , as well as an FAQ page.

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