I never understood what security that three-digit number offered. It’s still information floating around on the internet, right? If someone can steal my card number, what is so magical about the security code that makes it harder to steal?
How is having the security code equivalent to a signature? It’s just a three digit number, and it’s printed on the back of the card. If a dishonest store employee is keeping copies of card information, adding three more digits is trivial. And for online purchases you’re typing the security code as well as the card number, so now someone at the online vendor now has both.
Anyone who does that needs to take a serious look at their personal finance strategy.
So you are saying that if I wanted to go into business as credit card fraudster, I would be perfectly safe from prosecution? This is a no-risk form of crime? :dubious:
Nothing has no risk, but credit card fraud is pretty low risk if you spread it around and hit $500 here and $800 there. Local Police aren’t going to be interested, the merchant has no realistic ability to pursue and the credit card issuers couldn’t give less of a shit, since in almost all cases, they’re not the one holding the empty bag when it’s all over.
I don’t know what Amazon or Wall-Mart do about this kind of loss, but what am I supposed to do about a $700 fraudulent transaction? Call the FBI? Because the local PD really isn’t going to give a shit that some company 1200 miles away suffered a $700 loss. I’m not saying it’s right, I’m just saying what it is.
The idea of the code (CVV, CVV2, CCV, etc.) is that the number isn’t stored in the mag stripe that contains all the rest of your data, so a credit card skimmer installed on an ATM or gas pump won’t include that information. It’s a good idea in theory and probably does prevent a lot of fraud, but a lot of this fraud begins with stealing card data from an honest merchant. CVV is not allowed to be stored under PCI Compliance rules, but there are obviously flaws in the system.
Of course, in a business like a store or restaurant it would be trivial for an employee to photograph front and back of the card capturing name, number, and CVV code. They might even shoulder-surf the pin code, not that it does them any good without the card. (although for debit cards, it might work in a stripe-not-chip ATM?)
Yeah, anyone shipping fraudulently obtained goods to their own home address is begging for arrest. The trick is to find some way, as mentioned above, to receive shipments without being caught. Sometimes cards are used for online services which are harder to track.
IIRC the rule was if the card was present and signature matched, the merchant was safe, you and I ate the cost - or at least, those who paid 18%+ interest instead of paying off their bills every month, did. However, I can count on 1 finger the number of times in the last year a merchant checked the signature against the card. As for automatic withdrawals, it’s either automatically pay from my account or pay from a crdit card and the merchant eats the cost of my bonus points. Of course, I pay it off every month.
CookingWithGas has it best. An online purchase is a gamble, and not only that, but merchants with too many chargeback’s got the bonus double whammy of penalties also. **JakeJones **too has a good point, there are some elementary things a merchant can do to prevent such fraud. For more expensive orders, obviously requiring a signature, at least on delivery, is a good first step.
Plus, as mentioned, it seems police departments have better things to do than catch crooks. I’m still waiting to read the first news story where they say, “we can’t help you get your stolen car back, but we can offer you grief counselling to deal with your loss.”
Sure it might. Cloning a credit card in your physical possession is trivial. You need a mag stripe reader/writer that costs about $200-300 and a pair of eyeballs to record the CVV code.
For gods sake stop saying ‘wallyworld’