Goldfish (Visa) changing to Mastercard

steveteach

Hi I have been told today via email that my Goldfish Visa card account is going to change to a Morgan Stanley Mastercard because MS do not have a licence to issue Visa cards. They also say that my account on the website will not be correct until the new card is issued. The "Perks" will remain the same.

Has anyone else been told this, or have any more information? I only found out because I emailed them about my online statement being wrong.

nogginthenog

Check out https://www.silicon.com/financial services, or google the words "goldfish credit card hacker" and read the ZD NET blog
This is one huge cover up by morgan stanley.Which they will not admit to

noggin.

nogginthenog

edit card details through UK retailer


Andy McCue
silicon.com
May 02, 2006, 10:50 BST


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More than 4,000 UK credit card holders may have been affected by a security breach that occurred after hackers gained access to credit card details through an online retailer


A UK-based online retailer has been identified as the source of a security breach that has resulted in thousands of MasterCard and Visa holders having their credit cards cancelled this week.




At least 4,000 UK MasterCard holders are believed to have now been affected by the breach which occurred after hackers gained access to credit card details via the as-yet-unnamed e-tailer.

It was initially believed 2,000 credit card details had been stolen after silicon.com exclusively revealed that MasterCard advised card issuers to shut down the accounts of the cardholders affected and issue new cards after discovering the breach.

But a MasterCard holder whose card was stopped as a result of the security breach told ZDNet UK sister site silicon.com that his card issuer, Goldfish, part of Morgan Stanley, said more than 4,000 people have been affected.

The Clydesdale Bank and Morgan Stanley itself are two other MasterCard card issuers that have been proactively calling customers whose details have been compromised by the breach over the past week.

MasterCard said it is unable to name the retailer or release any more details about the incident because of the sensitivities of the ongoing investigation but stressed that MasterCard's own systems were not breached.

A statement issued by the company said: "MasterCard International is aware of a potential security breach at a UK-based retailer. But because this is an ongoing investigation, we cannot disclose specific details regarding the incident or comment, other than to say that we are co-operating and we have notified the banks that issue MasterCard cards to monitor for any suspicious account activity and take the necessary steps to protect cardholders."

Visa also said it notified the issuing banks of the affected cardholders as soon as the security breach was discovered.

A spokesman for Visa Europe said: "Visa Europe can confirm that it is aware of a suspected data compromise involving a UK-based online merchant. A full investigation is continuing and Visa is working closely with all appropriate organisations to resolve this issue as a matter of urgency."



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nogginthenog

A data breach at a retailer with UK online operations has highlighted the stark difference between the legal landscape here and in California - and how British consumers, retailers and financial services companies might be losing out.

In the UK retailers and financial services companies can keep details of such breaches secret from their customers, whereas in California a law has existed for almost three years meaning companies with operations or customers resident in that US state have to come clean about incidents of compromised, unencrypted personal data.

For more than two weeks silicon.com reporters, following feedback from dozens of readers, have been speaking to three constituencies to find out the source of the recent breach: credit card issuers, MasterCard and Visa, and, most importantly, UK e-tailers.

It isn't simply a case of naming and shaming - even if that's what a lot of customers are telling us they want - it's about the right way to do business.
On Wednesday 26 April, this publication broke the news that 2,000 credit card holders, including some customers of the Clydesdale Bank, had been informed that their MasterCard credit cards were being replaced because of a security breach.

At that time, as we put in calls to find out what the exact problem was, we felt like it was the bad old days of secrecy about online fraud. We wrote this leader article, unsurprisingly entitled 'Had a security breach? 'Fess up'.

The next day we revealed that UK holders of MasterCard cards from Morgan Stanley, and its Goldfish credit card arm, had also been hit.

MasterCard wouldn't say whether the confirmed breach was linked to some high-profile incidents in the US. By this stage readers were telling us they had been told many more people had been affected but we were unable to confirm exact numbers - although it was clearly in the thousands.

By the next day, Friday 28 April, silicon.com moved the story on and pushed both MasterCard and Visa to release more details about the source of the data breach.

MasterCard used the phrase "a UK-based retailer" while Visa's statement spoke of "a UK-based online merchant".

Other publications over the May Day long weekend picked up on the story but details were still scarce for them, without co-operative readers providing feedback - as they were to silicon.com.

This publication spoke to the Information Commissioner's Office. A spokeswoman told us: "There is nothing in the Data Protection Act that legally

King_Of_Fools

Could this be the UK etailer:
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=206859

self_obsessed

I called Goldfish about a similar web-related issue and I found out the following:

Goldfish had been notified of a potential security breach by Mastercard, this also affected other card issuers and Goldfish had to block the accounts as per Mastercard's instruction. I was lucky enough to be unaffected by this as I have only had a Visa card until recently (read on...)

At the same time, Goldfish are in the process of re-carding all their existing Visa card customers as they were purchased by Morgan Stanley in February and Morgan Stanley do not issue on the Visa network. I queried this and I was referred back to a letter I was sent in February which does indeed mention that my Visa card would be replaced with a Mastercard over the coming months. The girl did admit that in all fairness the reference to this change was only fleeting but since I keep all my paperwork I cannot argue!!

I too read that article in Silicon but am inclined to believe that the two issues are unrelated since my letter about the Visa-Mastercard change is dated 17th February which is long before the security breach article came to light - assuming that Silicon were on the ball and published the report while it was still an ongoing concern????

Bagpuss741

This happened with my M&S &more card, it was originally a visa card and within the last few months has changed to a mastercard.