An Amazon for identity
When Target was breached in 2013, it didn’t take long for credit and debit card data stolen from its systems to start flooding the underground forums and storefronts that trade in such merchandise.
One was Rescator – a black market outpost was selling more than 1 million of the stolen cards at prices ranging from $20 to $100.
Unlike the hundreds of other forums and shops selling stolen payment card data in the digital underworld, Rescator was different. Apart from the sheer quality of its “dumps,” or data from the magnetic stripe of cards, Rescator’s website is remarkably efficient and customer friendly.
The site offered potential buyers an opportunity to search for cards by the banks that issued them, by card type, expiration date, country, and by the type of data stored in different tracks in the magnetic stripe on the back of credit and debit cards. It offered buyers a way to check the validity of the stolen cards and claim refunds on cards that didn’t work.
