As motorists head out on the last big driving weekend of the summer, the credit card industry and gas-station owners are deploying everything from sophisticated software to heavy-duty padlocks to combat an epidemic of fuel-related theft and fraud, the Wall Street Journal reported today. The crackdown is gaining additional momentum because many gas stations will be among the last merchants to install equipment accepting a new generation of fraud-resistant cards. While many big merchants will have equipment in place by Oct. 1 to accept the new chip-based cards, tougher guidelines set by Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. don’t apply to gas stations until 2017. That delay could exacerbate what analysts, card companies and law-enforcement officials say has been a recent surge in fraud at the pump. The crime wave has been driven by the flood of stolen credit-card data easily accessible online, much of which was swiped in high-profile breaches. Last year alone, popular retailers Home Depot Inc., Staples Inc. and Supervalu Inc. were hit by hackers. Stolen numbers are available for as little as 50 cents apiece, experts say.
