19,000 credit cards listed online

Credit card data from 19,000 card owners in the UK was accidentally put online and fully available through a simple web search.

Included in the data were names and home addresses as well as full card information.

It is thought that the details, taken from Visa, Mastercard and American Express customers, were mistakenly put in the public domain by fraudsters, who planned to sell it on to other scammers.

Most of the cards on the list had already been cancelled according to a spokesman from APACS, the banking industry body.

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However, there are concerns that many credit card owners did not know their details have been leaked online.

A spokesman for APACS said: "The banking industry takes every data breach extremely seriously. We'd like to remind all online businesses of their responsibility to store card details securely."

Nigel Evans MP, chairman of the all-party parliamentary group on identity fraud, said: "This is hugely worrying. The credit card companies have a duty of care to inform all those involved that they are at risk of identity fraud."

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The data was originally posted on an unsecured server in Vietnam which was subsequently closed down.

However, a cached page was still available on Google after the server was shut. Google has since taken steps to completely remove the credit card information from its search index.

Last year, thousands of credit card details were accidentally exposed by the Cotton Traders website.