The Vermont Bankers Association says some Vermont customers were affected by a recent security breach at Heartland Payment Systems. That's not surprising since the company processes credit and debit transactions for millions of people across the nation.

No one knows exactly how many personal credit card numbers were exposed in the breach, but computer experts estimate it could have been as much as 100 million.

These breaches are becoming more common. TJ Maxx and Hannaford also reported recently that customer card numbers were put at risk.

So to find out why this is happening more often and what you can do to protect yourself, we're speaking with Dr. Peter Stephenson, Chair of the Department of Computing at Norwich University. Stephenson says there's a good reason why criminals are targeting companies like Heartland Payment Systems.

Click listen to hear the interview.