14 DAY TRIAL // After the Romanian CEC Bank revealed the fact that they were in the process of blocking and reissuing the credit cards of 17,000 of their customers, along with PINs, Visa Europe and the Romanian Association of Banks (RAB) also confirmed the data breach that may have affected cardholders in eastern Europe.
Visa Europe said in a statement to IT World that they recently learned of a breach at a European payment processor, but they failed to disclose the precise name and location of the merchant.
While they investigate the matter, RAB issued a statement of their own reporting that they were also informed on the security issue which may have led to the theft of data from credit cards that were utilized to perform a certain transaction.
“According to the Card Commission within the RAB, we don’t believe that any of the cardholders will be affected. If suspicious transactions are identified, customers must address the [card] issuing bank for further clarifications,” said RAB in the press release.
“Fraud monitoring departments within the banks took the necessary measures to identify incidents, closely monitoring the transactions that take place with credit cards to make sure their clients’ funds are safe.”
So far, CEC Bank is the only financial institution that publicly admitted they customers may be affected, immediately taking safety measures. According to local news reports, a CEC representative claimed that all the banks are aware of the situation, but they’re the only ones that are actively doing something about the situation.
“We apologize for the inconvenience, but considering the aforementioned facts, this action is purposed to protect the bank’s customers from the possibility of financial losses. This attack did not target CEC Bank’s cards alone and was not due to any bank vulnerability. Our clients’ money is safe,” CEC Bank reported at after they learned of the incident.
Update. After reading the article, a BRD - Groupe Société Générale client also came forward stating that the bank reissued her credit card without many explanations.
“A bank representative called me and asked me if I’d been traveling outside Romania. She then told me that my credit card was blocked due to some fraud suspicions and that it would be reissued along with another PIN,” the customer said.