Does anybody know what the original price of a bank account or credit card was before the prices were so low they're 'practically GIVING them away'?

I'm thinking they couldn't have been that much more expensive. Say its at a 90% discount. A single bank account should really cost $100. That's still a bargain, because how much time/effort/money does it take to then make successful use of an account without getting caught?

I wonder if this five-alarm sale will actually make the practice more common or less; I'm sure a lot of effort is involved in getting a hold of these numbers, and for $10 bucks is it worth it to the retailer to obtain them in the first place? It'd be interesting to see what a sudden drop in ID theft does to all the people that try to sell (IMHO, worthless) protection against it...

A friend of mine blogged about a proposal for greenvertising. Why not?