At least if new developments in the TJX data breach case play out in favor of the plaintiffs.

Several banks are suing the company, which probably first came to your attention earlier this year as yet another in a long string of companies to lose valuable customer data, in hopes of recovering some of the losses they incurred for covering the clean up from the mess. As most card holders are aware, the card issuer is responsible for dealing with and absorbing the costs of lost or stolen cards as long as they are informed in a timely manner. But while the pain and difficulty of cleaning up your personal matters is generally incentive enough to keep track of your cards on an individual basis, apparently the resulting poor publicity has done little to persuade retailers—the other half of the exposure—to do likewise.

According to court documents published by Larry Dignan, the banks are alleging that TJX's neglect of security best practices was both known to the company and directly responsible for the breach... and since TJX, therefore, could have prevented the loss, it's time for them to pay up.

As Dignan notes, this case may provide significant precedent to encourage retailers to deal with card information more carefully... and that's a good thing.