We may never actually know the who, what, where, why, and especially HOW.

If people knew exactly how easily it was for hostile entities to bring our credit card-based economy to a screeching, blistering halt it would scare the living $hit out of everyone.

Europe has had a credit card system in place for several years wherein each time the cc is used, a tiny embedded chip on the card itself rolls over the card number, making it impossible to duplicate the card.

Sources say this cc encryption technology has been available to US cc companies for a while now, but they refuse to use it because of added cost to them (the cc companies).