Credit Card Theives So Good They Have Too Much Data...

Some interesting statistics from a new report from Verizon Business. The Washington Post security writer sums it up nicely in terms of the payment card data market:

[Verizon] said it responded to at least 90 confirmed data breaches last year involving roughly 285 million consumer records, a number that exceeded the combined total number of breached records from cases the company investigated from 2004 to 2007. Breaches at banks and financial institutions were responsible for 93 percent of all such records compromised last year, Verizon found.

This has resulted in a huge decrease in the price per credit card in the black market:

As a result, the stolen identities and credit and debit cards for sale in the underground markets is outpacing demand for the product, said Bryan Sartin, director of investigative response at Verizon Business.  Verizon found that profit margins associated with selling stolen credit card data have dropped from $10 to $16 per record in mid-2007 to less than $0.50 per record today.