The mail: An unimpressive Sweetbay response

So tell me please, what am I missing here? Hannaford/Sweetbay shows no remorse for their failure and makes no offer to at least offer monitoring services for our credit card accounts. They feel badly about the data being compromised and suggest that we monitor our credit card statements. This seems to me to fall far short of what they should be doing. Some folks cannot monitor their accounts on a daily basis and must wait for their monthly statements. Then it will be up to them to fix the identity theft mess. Just another example of business as usual and the consumer be damned. As individuals we are held accountable for our failures and businesses should be also. -- J.D. White

I tend to agree about Hford/Sweetbay. It was a pretty major compromise and I would think a company that had subjected thousands of its customers to criminals would be a little more pro-active.

Comments

[Chris Jenkins]

I shop there frequently. If it becomes an issue to enough people, there will be a class action, and something will be done about it. As long as companies are not held to any accounting for data protection, they will not need to fake remorse they do not feel.

[Karen]

If I understand this all corretly, there is no chance of identity theft. Only account numbers were acessed, no personal information at all. Hanover Said they can't even contact those affected because they only have account numbers, no names or any contact info.

[Jan Allyn]

Just to be safe, I canceled my debit card and ordered a new one from my bank. Easier to do that than clean up the mess if a bunch of unauthorized charges start appearing. The bank said they'd had a parade of people come through doing the same thing.

[Lisa]

This has happened to TJ Max and Marshalls, as well as even to the Veteran's Adminsitration -- accounts and social security numbers hacked into and stolen. One way to help monitor your credit and protect yourself is to use a fraud alert program, this means you would be notified when and if any credit is applied for using your personal information. There are several services to puchase such as TrustedID, IdentityTruth and Lifelock.

[Don Mott]

The next best way to avoid this is to pay the old fashioned way, cash. No interest payments and no chance of identity theft. Pretty simple!

[Proletariatcsp]

We are well into the 21st century. I feel its time that we stop compiling useless social security numbers on duplicatable stationary. Its time to stop wasting tens of millions every year on identity theft campaigns. And it is certainly time to stop allowing illegal aliens into this country on stolen or forged documents. The fact is 39 years ago we put a man on the moon, and now we can’t overcome identity theft. Give me another Martini. Why aren’t we using our fingerprints more efficiently. If the charge card swipe at the grocery store can read a magnetic strip 1000th of an inch thick, I am absolutely certain it could do the same with our finger or even our eye. Just imagine how hard it would be for criminals to make any real purchases while managing to stay of the radar. And as far as retaining our constitutional right to make “under the table” exchanges well, there will always be cash.