Swiping left on magnetic stripes • Hacker News Board

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#141

Post by Symbiote » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 10:24 PM UTC

ddek wrote: post #41

firebaze wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't remember ever having paid using the magnetic stripe in Europe since 2010 (having been to Spain, Italy, France, Netherlands, Romania and living in Germany), before I didn't use a credit card at all since it wasn't very popular here. Honestly curios: where (and when) did you make that observation?

I’m young enough to literally never have paid by swiping. Except for my exchange year in Texas.

Same here, but Britain introduced EMV cards in 2004 (France and I think Australia were earlier, but with the previous version).

So you can have never paid by swiping and be well over 30.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#142

Post by latchkey » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 10:25 PM UTC

larrybud wrote: post #133

latchkey wrote: post #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

While your point is valid regarding a crazy number of middlemen, I've also paid via the QR code on the receipt at a number of restaurants recently and I love it! No need to flag down a server when it's time to pay; I just scan it on my phone, click on apple pay, enter the tip, and I'm done!

Don't get me wrong, I love it too. I didn't suggest getting rid of the QR code, just the backend flow of middlemen taking fees from the restaurant.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#143

Post by MR4D » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 10:28 PM UTC

secabeen wrote: post #98

bovermyer wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno, I've had plenty of instances where swiping a card doesn't work. Sometimes I'd have to put a plastic bag around the card and _then_ swipe it.

I've had that too, but when that happens, it's obvious to others; they can see you swiping again and again. Failed NFC just looks like you're standing there.

> Failed NFC just looks like you're standing there.

Or worse...it feels like you're just standing there. God, I hate that!

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#144

Post by Symbiote » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 10:35 PM UTC

paulgerhardt wrote: post #29

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #8

I'm pretty sure the magstripe is already somewhat disabled over here. My debit mastercard refuses to work outside of the European union unless I disable the geo locking in the banking app, and when my chip was broken the readers kept telling me to put the chip in.

That’s just a bit on the mag strip that encodes if your card has a chip present. You can flip it with a writer and use the magnet strip again if you want. It’s quicker as one doesn’t have to wait for the Javacard OS on the chip to boot up and handshake. (Ie swipe and walk away vs insert, wait 4 seconds, remove). Wouldn’t do this on my debit card but it’s fine on credit cards with chargeback protection.

Isn't that going to lead to the transaction being denied, either by the bank (which knows there's a chip), or even the reader (does it know that all cards beginning WXYZ have chips, for example?)?

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#145

Post by klipt » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 10:58 PM UTC

zz865 wrote: post #39

gruez wrote: 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

Assuming US starts to let people in again.

There's a specific list of countries you can't travel from. Spend 2 weeks in any country not on that list and you're allowed in.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#146

Post by MichaelZuo » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 11:06 PM UTC

jjk166 wrote: post #135

FridayoLeary wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>painful transition How painful could it possibly be to go and buy a new card reader? Why doesn't the payments provider offer them as part of the service? They are not so expensive.

The reader may be cheap, but the things its integrated with aren't. If it costs $20k to replace a gas pump and you have a half dozen pumps, the cost of replacing them might be comparable to the value of the gas station. A grocery store point of sale system is even more expensive, around $40k a pop. Maybe you're lucky and the manufacturer of your current setup has made it in such a way that the card reader can be swap…

It is weird that a lot of folks in the thread ignore the very real costs of transition. If there was a nationwide subsidy system for retailers from merchants and banks for fraud reduction en masse, then the transition would be smoother. But since there isn’t it’s partially an iterated prisoner’s dilemma.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#147

Post by skookum » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 11:20 PM UTC

akmarinov wrote: post #123

I’m from Europe and honestly I’ve never used a magnetic strip to pay with a card. Looks really cool though.

If you think the magnetic strip looks cool, wait until you see a credit card imprinter!

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#148

Post by skookum » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 11:25 PM UTC

vidanay wrote: post #137

aidenn0 wrote: 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…

I've been in a retailer within the last two years that still used paper and and imprint machine to process credit cards.

I last had this happen 4 years ago at a pharmacy that was having network issues. But now I no longer have any cards with embossed letters so the imprinting fallback would not longer work for me. I supposed they could fill in the slip manually which seems equivalent to a card-not-present transaction but without the instant confirmation?

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#149

Post by dmd » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 11:26 PM UTC

drclau wrote: post #12

Why does it take so long? Where’s the bottleneck? Where I lived over the last years (two countries in Europe), I don’t even have to use the physical card. I just use contactless payments with the phone. Prior to that, it was contactless with card. Even ATMs work with contactless (not all, yet). Prior to that, it was chip. I honestly don’t even recall the time when the magnetic stripe was needed. (edit) Think of this:…

Because here in the US there are still gas stations using embossed credit card systems who get confused when your card doesn't have raised numbers on it.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#150

Post by dom96 » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 11:48 PM UTC

gruez wrote: post #62

robcohen wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really is mind blowing to me. Especially in a pandemic, why why why require a signature for anything? This is one of the few things that would reduce exposure that we already have a technical solution for. I just don’t understand.

>Especially in a pandemic, why why why require a signature for anything? This is one of the few things that would reduce exposure that we already have a technical solution for. Turns out infection from surfaces is basically a non-issue. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/08/health/coronavirus-hygien...

Got any non-paywalled sources handy?