Get the GLOBE?? Some thief may have your credit card number!!!

If you subscribe to the Worcester T+G, you might be screwed, too:

BOSTON -- The Boston Globe and the Worcester Telegram & Gazette said slips containing the names and credit card numbers of as many as 240,000 subscribers of both newspapers were accidentally delivered with bundles of papers last weekend in Worcester.

Officials of the newspapers, both owned by the New York Times Co., said Tuesday they were notifying customers of the mistake.
...The Telegram & Gazette said the slips also contained routing information for 1,100 of its customers who pay by check.

The financial data was on the back side of paper that had inadvertently been recycled and used for routing slips in 9,000 bundles of the Sunday Telegram & Gazette distributed to retailers and newspaper carriers, the newspapers said in a written statement.

http://www.wftv.com/irresistible/6651068/detail.html

If i wanted credit card numbers I'd get a job as a waiter. Simple. How many times have you handed your card to a waiter, who then walks away with it, out of your sight? This is not nearly the problem that it is made out to be.

You know where your card has been, who has handled it. But say you subscribed a year or so ago, and next thing ya know, a good year or more later, you're being billed for calls to South Africa or penile enhancement devices???

This IS a big deal--it's sloppiness, it is inattentiveness, and it is unacceptable. Par for the course for the NYT group, IMO.

Sure you know you went to a restaurant buut what happens if they wait a year to use your card? You do know you gave your info to the globe right?

Seriously this whole business about credit card fraud (or as the credit card industry has rebranded it "identity theft" is crap. If someone goes out and charges stuff to your card you contest the charges and you are not responsible for them. It's really not the crisis everyone seems to think it is.

Having been a "victim" of identity theft, i really don't understand why everyone gets so freaked out by this. Getting random credit card numbers and information is just about the easiest thing in the world. Specifically targetting an individual is tougher, but frankly that's what dumpster diving is for.

If he is stealing card numbers, likely he needs them now. Unless he is cheerfully living on his minimum wage and tips, often without medical insurance, in the hopes of making a hit a year down the line...and not knowing if his potential target closed out the card to get a better rate with another company....

Certainly, it is incumbent upon the card owner to check their statements, that is self evident. My gripe is with the sloppy Globe and Worcester T/G--this cockup is not some sleazy waiter engaged in criminality, or some nefarious internet hacker, this is some stupid ass who didn't shred financial data when he or she should have, instead allowing it to be recycled with sensitive info on it. There is no excuse for that sort of abject stupidity. It was entirely avoidable.

If I were a subscriber, I'd be triple checking my statements.

The difference here, though, is that those routing slips attached to the bundles will be seen by anyone who gets bundled papers, from bicycle carriers to newsstand employees. It's different from the restaurant case, where a minimal number of that restaurant's employees will ever see your number.

But anyway, all anyone needs to do if they think they might have been affected is to look at all your online statements and see if there's any surprising activity. Not a hard problem to solve if you're responsible with your credit.