A gang of shadowy hackers tears through the systems of big-box retailers, making off with millions of credit and debit card numbers in a matter of weeks and generating headlines around the country.
Target and Neiman Marcus last week? Nope. This oh-so-familiar attack occurred in 2005.
That’s when Albert Gonzalez and cohorts – including two Russian accomplices — launched a three-year digital rampage through the networks of Target, TJ Maxx, and about half a dozen other companies, absconding with data for more than 120 million credit and debit card accounts. Gonzalez and other members of his team eventually were caught; he’s serving two concurrent sentences for his role, amounting to 20 years and a day in prison, but the big-box breaches go on.
The latest string of hacks attacking Target, Neiman Marcus, and others raise an obvious question: How is it that nearly a decade after the Gonzalez gang pulled off its heists, little has changed in the protection of bank card data?
