Well, we wouldn’t want the problem to be fixed, now would we?
That suggests there would be little or no fraud with chip-and-pin. So does anyone know if there is less credit card fraud in nations with chip-and-pin cards?
They’re ubiquitous now. Though I’d love to go full chip and pin. Several cards do have that feature as well (and can be used internationally pretty transparently) but many do not.
What is not ubiquitous are portable card scanners.
We’re getting there, even if some folks have to be dragged kicking and screaming the entire way.
I live in the middle of bum-fark nowhere. I have one card that is chipped and supposedly can be tapped but tap card scanners are pretty rare around here. I’ve never used that feature. It would be pretty cool if it actually works.
The most of the locally ubiquitous Kwik Trip gas stations/C-stores have tap scanners at their pumps but KT issued CC’s are not tappable, nor are they chipped. I’m guessing you can can tap at the pump if you are using a Visa/MC card but I use their store issued mag strip cards so I can get “points”. They also require a PIN for any transaction. It’s a closed system, you can only use their cards at their stores. Seems secure enough to me.
Local mom & pop restaurants & stores take cards but they also make a big deal of giving a 5% discount if you pay with cash. I carry a wad of cash if I’m planning to go out to eat or buy something at the local hardware store. I’m cheap that way.
This was a conscious decision by the US banks to not to Chip & PIN. It’s easier for you (the consumer) to use a card w/o a PIN, less to type in, less to remember. If you forget your PIN for Bank A’s card or have another bank’s card that doesn’t require a PIN you’re going to use Bank B’s card & Bank A won’t make any $ because you’re not using their card. Once you pull out & start using Bank B’s card, there’s a strong likelihood that that card will become your primary card & Bank A’s card will sit unused in your wallet
Ease of use & security are opposite ends of the spectrum. Great, we all pay for that collectively with higher rates due to more fraud losses.
Oh for fuck’s sake. Doper’s paranoia about being poisoned by servers will never end.
All that will happen is that staff will gossip about you while having their shift drinks. That’s it.
Just suggesting that the degree of paranoia involved in following servers to the register/card reader and peering over their shoulders to make sure they’re not stealing from you could well have repercussions incompatible with good service. It doesn’t have to involve “poisoning”.
A low stress solution to the restaurant issue is paying cash.
Yep. My card does not leave my hand. Ever. If someone wanted to “take it out back”, I would leave. With my card. In fact, even in the olden times before the readers were taken to the table, I would usually follow the server back to the front counter, or station to oversee the process. Never had any push back.
All my cards are Chip & Pin.
Am I missing some difference of definition? I tap or insert my chipped card, then I have to to input my PIN*.
fyi, Average American dude here.
*The English translation on an ATM in Africa said “Step 3: Type in your Personal Secret Number.”
In the US, you don’t always need a PIN. It depends on the transaction.
I am somewhat miffed by the central premise.
The OP is reporting he is the target of attempted check fraud?
As in a little form you fill out at the store?
Or as in a form you fill out at home to pay a bill?
Are they debit cards?
Average American retail worker here…
The prevalence of Chip and PIN usage in the US is very much a rarity. If you were issued with a PIN on a credit or debit card by default your financial institution is an outlier. I have four cards in my wallet, all issued by top 20 banks.
The only time I have used a PIN is when withdrawing cash from an ATM using the ATM card that was converted to a debit card about 15 years ago.
Cards may have chip and PIN capability, but typically you have to ask to have the PIN set up, and almost no one does it, or even realizes they have this option.
Good question.
My debit card has a PIN, but sometimes I’m not asked for it when using it. Sometimes I am.
My credit card has no PIN at all. I sometimes need to sign a receipt, sometimes I don’t.
(I’m speaking for myself of course, not @digs.)
The last job I had before retiring was for a card merchant services company – the link between the merchant and the card association (V/MC). In Canada with the laws different yeah, the card rarely if ever leaves the card holders’ hands which caused a problem in restaurants that weren’t casual enough that you paid at the counter. When I left the company was still working with two different hardware manufacturers trying to get the wireless connection to be reliable
Thanks for chiming in… same for me. No rhyme or reason as to when I need a signature on a credit card, or a PIN and/or signature on my debit card.
And our pharmacy has a screen that asks if I want to use my debit card as Debit or Credit. No matter which I choose, I need to insert the chip end of the card, enter my PIN, AND do the “try to sign on a barely-competent screen that turns any signature into a scrawl” thing.
By the way, the only time I was scammed was by someone following me at an ATM and withdrawing the max amount three times in a row. The bank told me there was a “skimmer” that read the raised numbers and a camera to capture the PIN.
Interestingly, the bank issued me a new card with no raised numbers. “Smart”, I thought. Until it expired and the next card had raised skimmable numbers again.
The bank said they had surveillance video, but then decided that looking it up was too much trouble so they called me and recorded me saying I did not make those withdrawals.
We are going through the inlaws’ paperwork, and found a bunch of printouts with MIL’s notes on them. They are all from very weird gmail addresses, talking about payment for McAfee and/or Norton, sometimes in the hundreds of dollars. Some notes suggest that the charges never hit her bank account. She tells us the account has been compromised numerous times.
I don’t know if she paid for any such services; sadly, this is not implausible.
We think there are scammers who have basically identified vulnerable seniors and tend to share the information. Luckily, my SIL is now watching the bank account like a hawk. And I’m going to have to get in touch with the IRS to make sure their fraud case from 3 years ago is really, truly resolved; for example, one printout of a letter has a handwritten note saying “spoke with IRS, it’s fixed”, and yet a dunning letter appears several months after that.
I haven’t had a restaurant take my card away from the table for years and I have dined in both down and up market places across Europe.
The staff who bring the card machine to the table won’t even touch the card since COVID.
Fucking hell. The wife asked me this morning what I ordered from Wayfair for $228. Well, since our apartment couldn’t hold another stick of furniture, and that’s what Wayfair mostly deals in, the answer was “Oh, fuck me!”
Sure enough, some asswipe hacked the account and ordered a bed using our Paypal link. I immediately cancelled the order that showed up on our email, went to the site and changed the password to something from Last Pass, then noticed that there were 7 items sitting in the shopping cart. Wellwellwell. . .$4500 worth of furniture for some bitch in Colorado, who, I’m sure, was just waiting for her new bed to arrive to signal that she could get away with this.
Got online chat with someone who kept me waiting until I got tired of it, but I gave them the person’s name and address, which I hope is real, cuz she needs the cops knocking on her fucking door. If I lived anywhere near there, I’d pay her a visit myself.
Or she could be the equivalent of a money mule. Someone else hacked your account and she took a job “handling office purchases” or some such.
Even if it is, she still deserves to at least have the living hell frightened out of her.