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Swiping left on magnetic stripes

mastercard.com

101–110 of 325 posts

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#101
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To play devil's advocate – who cares? We've had magnetic strips for decades and they work fine. Yes, they're insecure but anti-fraud measures taken by the bank can mitigate that. If this helps more stores accept payments without having a painful transition isn't that worth it? I use Apple Pay most places but I don't mind having to use a strip once in a while or if others do.

Think about who is paying for that fraud. Prior to EMV liability shift, Banks paid for the fraud. After Liability Shift, merchants are paying for fraud using magstripe. Merchants don't want to be responsible for the fraud, so they are incentivized to get rid of the mag stripe.

Depends on the transaction, but merchants can absolutely be liable for fraud before the EMV shift...

Also the rate of mag fraud is still pretty low, more Online Fraud which was ALWAYS liable to the merchant and did not see to do much ti incentivize any changes there.

Causing 90% of your customers pain to save less than 1% on fraud is likely going to cost merchants more than just paying for the fraud, which is also the math online merchants used. Online merchants that have huge fraud prevention lost more customers than the fraud....

Hell I remember one time a online merchant wanted me to submit more info after the sale for anti-fraud... I cancelled the order and bought from someone else

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#102
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I honestly don’t even recall the time when the magnetic strip was needed. for when you fly over to the US and need to use your card

I'm in the US. The only places I've seen in the last year or so that still use the magnetic stripes are gas stations, and all the ones I usually go to take the chip.

Alternatively, I have never in the US been subject to a situation where if a chip didn't work that the magstrip wasn't allowed.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#104
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NFC (EMV Mode) is partially encrypted and much more secure than magnetic stripe

I wasn't aware of that mode. Is there a way of figuring out if your card has NFC (EMV Mode), or is just blasting out the CC number/expiration date when powered up via induction?

Almost all NFC you find these days is going to be a form of EMV and is encrypted.

There was a form of contactless magstripe (MSD) that was not encrypted and has been phased out of usage as of like, late 2019 via card update bulletins.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#105
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The USA is a big holdup. I just traveled across the country and there are still filling (petrol) stations where the only card reader is stripe. See also other comments about the stripe being a fallback for chip as chip readers on POS terminals seem to be more fragile than magnetic stripe readers. FWIW, Contactless is very hit-or-miss for me in the US; about 1/3 the time it just doesn't work at all (even with multiple…

On your point about contact less being hit-or-miss, this very much goes away when you have a number of options for vendors to choose from on the market, with terminals being supplied mainly by banks who want the business. Both competition and a lack of desire to deal with merchants having issues with the payment system provided lead to increases in reliability. The overseas market has been saturated with chips for 10…

I have asked in several stores (in Denmark) where contactless doesn’t work, but the terminal has the required hardware - The merchant has to pay a fee to enable contactless. My auto mechanic bitched loudly about it, until I told him he wanted $200 for enabling “daytime running lights” in my rear lights, which is also just “flipping a bit”

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#106

"The magnetic stripe will start to disappear in 2024 from Mastercard payment cards in regions, such as Europe, where chip cards are already widely used. Banks in the U.S. will no longer be required to issue chip cards with a magnetic stripe, starting in 2027. By 2029, no new Mastercard credit or debit cards will be issued with a magnetic stripe. Prepaid cards in the U.S. and Canada are currently exempt from this chan…

My, really setting themselves aggressive targets huh.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#107
I'd prefer we just phase out MasterCard. I went to a restaurant the other day. QR code on the receipt. Scan that and it opens up Toast. Toast then connects to Apple Pay, which then connects to my credit card. No less than 3 middlemen to pay the restaurant, is absurd.

QRCode -> Wallet on my phone holding stablecoin on a L2 like polygon (which is collecting APY through DeFi) -> Restaurant

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some reasons it still exists, however, it is no longer required and merchants/POS systems ought to start phasing it out. In the US, the way we do tip on receipt is a lot more natural if you're asking for a signature. Without a signature, you're just handing someone a tip option, which is awkward with our current way of doing things. Some merchants opt to keep signature enabled because it gives them a fuzzy…

Lot's of payment terminals in the UK allow the customer to input the service charge themselves before they enter their PIN. Otherwise the waiter/waitress typically asks you how much you want to pay before typing in the amount. If you're splitting the bill then they need to do that anyway.

>>Otherwise the waiter/waitress typically asks you how much you want to pay before typing in the amount.

That is never going to work in the US. Very few people would be comfortable with that.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some reasons it still exists, however, it is no longer required and merchants/POS systems ought to start phasing it out. In the US, the way we do tip on receipt is a lot more natural if you're asking for a signature. Without a signature, you're just handing someone a tip option, which is awkward with our current way of doing things. Some merchants opt to keep signature enabled because it gives them a fuzzy…

Lot's of payment terminals in the UK allow the customer to input the service charge themselves before they enter their PIN. Otherwise the waiter/waitress typically asks you how much you want to pay before typing in the amount. If you're splitting the bill then they need to do that anyway.

Here in Canada, portable POS terminals usually have a screen before "TAP/INSERT CARD" that says "Add tip?" and offers vendor-set default options, usually either 10%/12%/15% or 12%/15%/20%. The fourth option is always "custom", which allows people to enter 0 if they wish. (There are also payment flows that have an initial "Yes/No" on the "Add Tip?" question, in cases where a tip may or may not make sense, e.g. a bakery/deli that offers both high-touch dine-in and extremely-low-touch "we just take it from the fridge and give it to you" take-out service.)

Since Canada and the US have basically the same tipping culture, these POS systems seem to be already tailored for adoption in the US market (or at least, being cloned by US POS mfgrs.) Not sure why they haven't been.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#110
Even in the US, I can't remember when I last had to use the magstrip. [1] I could probabbly degauss the magnetic strip and not have any issues. If you have a chip debit card that you never use... it probably isn't a bad idea to make the card chip only.

What I actually want is a specific bank alert if the card is used without the chip. Currently I just make any transaction over $20 send an email.

[1] I guess at resturants where they actually take the card for a minute, I don't know if it's chip or magstrip transaction.

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