Apparently last month Google’s super powerful indexing systems found a web site in Vietnam on which were posted the details of 19,000 UK credit cards. The list included the names, addresses including post codes and full credit card details of cardholders including Mastercard, Visa and American Express clients.

The web site was only viewable for a day or two before Google removed the site from its index but the very existence of such a site should make us worry.

A spokesman for the banking industry tried his best to calm the situation down by observing that “many of the cards on the list had been stopped and others had expired”. Does that make you feel much better? Not me!

And what did the credit card companies do? According to press reports, they “applied a warning flag to those cards which were still active so they could monitor any unusual activity”. And did the credit card companies send a warning to the account holders?

NO, THEY DIDN’T!

This hugely worrying. The fact that these details fell into criminal hands is bad enough, but for the card companies to fail to warn their clients is similarly “criminal”. Surely the credit card operators have a duty of care which they have largely ignored in respect of these customers?

This also serves to warn each of us to take care whenever we use our credit and debit cards. And that especially applies when we go abroad. Never let the card go out of your sight especially at petrol stations and restaurants.