Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

gigaom.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 182 posts

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#81

Post by fit2rule »

walshemj wrote: post #29
altoz wrote: post #23

This seems a great way to steal other people's credit cards. You can literally duplicate someone's card on your "coin". Now there's a super easy way for someone working in a restaurant to get your credit card information and sell it.

Yes I really want to have a reprogrammable CC that I hand to a waiter NOT - Why not just have the fed mandate Chip and Pin after a certain date like Europe did.

Only you are able to reprogram your Coin, it is paired with your phone. Two things which admittedly do get lost together, but still ..

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#82

Post by andrewfong »

silviogutierrez wrote: post #74
andrewfong wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it's not worth the cost. On the consumer side, chargebacks are easy. Credit card companies bear the brunt of the cost of fraud. They all have the incentive in the world to start rolling out chip and pin technology. The fact that they haven't probably demonstrates that the math doesn't work out.

It's actually the end merchant (seller) that bears the cost of fraud. So credit card companies have little incentive to fix this, beyond customer support costs. Say you sell a camera to someone using a stolen credit card. The real owner of the card gets his money back after doing a chargeback. The thief keeps the camera. The merchant loses a camera, the money, and gets a ding in his credit card merchant reputation.

Seems like the legislative solution then would just be to shift (at least some of) the burden to the credit card processors then.

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#83

Post by jmspring »

techaddict009 wrote: post #51

"Q. Will my Coin work outside the U.S.? A. Not in all cases. U.S.-based customers: Coin will work overseas, but we recommend that you bring a backup card when you travel. Customers located outside of the U.S.: Coin does not support EMV yet. If the country you live it requires it we recommend holding off your purchase for now." Found this in FAQ section.

I've got a few cards and travel somewhat regularly to Europe. I've specifically been asking various card vendors that I have for chip and pin/EMV based cards. For the most part, they seem to be rolling them out at the high end rather than making them available at the normal "consumer"/reward cards.

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#84

Post by andrewfong »

snitko wrote: post #42
walshemj wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I really want to have a reprogrammable CC that I hand to a waiter NOT - Why not just have the fed mandate Chip and Pin after a certain date like Europe did.

Why not just pay with Bitcoin? Really, after Bitcoin, using credit cards seems like an invitation to be robbed.

Because chargebacks are relatively easy with credit cards and the merchant bank bears the cost of fraud. With Bitcoin, if you steals your coins, there's no way to undo that.

On top of that, there's all the convenience issues that plastic brings when out in the real world. Using bitcoin requires a computing device of some sort that's significantly less robust than Coin, a chip & pin card, or a piece of plastic.

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#85

Post by maxerickson »

ecaron wrote: post #28
zequel wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They should but only 40-50% do, I write "Ask for ID" on the signature portion. The ones that read it, ask me for it. Better than a signature that a cashier won't question anyhow.

In Minnesota, I'm having more merchants threaten to take my card for just saying that. Visa seems to say you should write "See ID" and also sign it: http://usa.visa.com/merchants/risk_management/card_present.h...

I was curious about this and browsed through their operating regulations. It says something to the effect of "Visa considers a signature box that only says See ID to be blank".

So the pedantic response to your second sentence is that they consider the See ID irrelevant (and once there is a signature, it is apparently a violation of the merchant agreement to ask for ID, but I didn't look for that in the operating regulations).

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#86

Post by tomkin »

> "...a problem most of us have."

Is this a real problem? I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you can't determine a problem by telling me this is a problem we all have. I'm not buying the angle, sorry. Not like I'm against this idea, but the sell is a little ridiculous.

How would this work with chip-based cards? In Canada, some of the banks have ditched the magstripe, so not sure how scalable this is - since the encryption on the chip is specifically engineered to prevent this kind of interception.

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#87

Post by harryzhang »

This is awesome but I'm concerned about how it would be too easy to switch cards (accidentally). In the FAQ they say it's fine if its dropped, handed into a booklet, etc. Sounds fine in theory but what happens when you hand the card to the waiter/bartender and they happen just to grab it where the circle is? Won't that change the card?

Another concern is in bars - your CC# gets a tiny bit wet (drunk ppl, spilled drinks on table, etc.). Does this card stop working if its splashed a little?

My two cents.

This is awesome though.

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#88

Post by dougk16 »

pit wrote: post #78

Why do people have so many credit cards? I use one (1) debit card to pay for things, or cash.

I always use a credit card, just for the fraud protection...no idea how, but my CC has been used fraudulently 3 times over the years, and each time, with a quick phone call, the charge is gone, basically no questions asked (they assume fraud and go from there)...contrast that with a debit card where the money is actually being taken out of your account.

My wife recently used her debit card at a restaurant and they accidentally double-charged her. The restaurant recognized their mistake, but were being pains getting us refunded, requiring bank statements and such, so instead I called the bank (Wells Fargo), and it was 2 weeks before they said "Sorry, nothing we can do, take it up with the restaurant." We ended up getting the money back, but it was a real pain.

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#89

Post by dannygarcia »

brsch wrote: post #35
jqueryin wrote: post #6

This is potentially useful for the US market as chip/pin is very new to us and only recently rolled out via major banks this year (I literally just got my new Visa card with a chip). I can see how Europe is far ahead of the curve. My initial questions/concerns are as follows: Will this be usable in ATMs? I can't visibly tell if it's too wide to fit. Is there any planned security functionality to lock the card via you…

Based on Coin's FAQ: 1. Yes, it should be usable with ATMs without issue. 2. You cannot lock your coin with a password, but it will deactivate after it loses contact with a phone after a user-specified amount of time. In theory, I'd assume you can disable Bluetooth on your iPhone and it will effectively "lock" your Coin until it can pair with your device again.

Would be nice if there was a way to physically unlock it. I can imagine my phone dying – preventing me from making any kind of purchase.

Re: Meet Coin (YC W13), a startup creating a universal credit card

#90

Post by jes5199 »

snitko wrote: post #42
walshemj wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I really want to have a reprogrammable CC that I hand to a waiter NOT - Why not just have the fed mandate Chip and Pin after a certain date like Europe did.

Why not just pay with Bitcoin? Really, after Bitcoin, using credit cards seems like an invitation to be robbed.

it takes too long to confirm a transaction with bitcoin. Also the risk of having your bitcoins stolen is high - the reason credit cards exist is because reversible transactions are preferred to using cash. The credit card company acts as an escrow system.

I could imagine someone making a credit card that was denominated in bitcoin, but that would be a whole different technology stack than using raw bitcoins.

Post reply on HN