Investigation into Schnucks card-hacking incident nears end

ST. LOUIS — More than 2 million credit and debit cards at nearly all of Schnuck Markets' stores may have been compromised as part of a recent hacking incident, the company said.

The company nevertheless emphasized that cardholders' names, addresses and other identifying information was not accessed, only the card numbers and expiration dates. About 2.4 million cards are believed to have been compromised at 79 of the chain's 100 stores, and the company has set up a Web page with information on the attack and a video by chairman and CEO Scott Schnuck.

"On behalf of myself, the Schnuck family and all of our 15,000 teammates, I apologize to everyone affected by this incident," Schnuck said. "Over the years, technology has helped us deliver customer service, but it also introduces risks that we have actively worked to manage through compliance audits, encryption technology and various other security measures."

The company said last month that it was the victim of an attack on its computer network in which a computer code was designed to capture magnetic stripe data from customers' credit and debit cards.