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Privacy – Forget Your Credit Card

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Re: Privacy – Forget Your Credit Card

#321

Post by ryanlol »

ARolek wrote: post #272
Splines wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High level question about virtual cards and the implication of their implementation: 16 digits doesn't seem like a very high number of available cards, especially since at least two of those numbers are reserved (checksum and IIN number). At some point numbers are going to be recycled, right? Or am I massively underestimating the # of credit cards out in the world? It seems like if a large # of people get a new # for…

I believe expiration date plays into the possible combos. I'm not sure if CVC does.

You only need the PAN to charge the card, and many banks will gladly accept charges on expired cards even if provided with an expiration date in the past.

Re: Privacy – Forget Your Credit Card

#322

Post by codelitt »

umeshunni wrote: post #100
wfunction wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a general question about card numbers. Say there are 3E9 people on Earth, each with 3 cards. That's around 10 digits right there. There's 1 digit for checksum. I imagine you'd want to leave space for least 1000 financial institutions around the world, so that's another 4 digits. Which means you can only have 100 transactions per person. None of this takes into account the fact that the same people are issued wa…

The short answer is that, in theory, we are running out. It's kept in check now by some amount of BIN & account number recycling by financial institutions. If you're curious about the number scheme, check out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_7812

I don't believe we are that close to running out though, are we?

Using the number scheme, this person calculated^1 that (assuming Amex starts issuing 16 digit cards) there would be 3*10^14 + 10^11 or 4.001e+14 possible combinations.

[1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/theydidthemath/comments/3wj8eb/requ...

Re: Privacy – Forget Your Credit Card

#323

Post by nicky0 »

narrowrail wrote: post #208
sundvor wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the TWiET podcast made a big deal recently about how chips are finally making their way to their cards. I couldn't help but laugh. IIRC, Norway had those since the late 80s. And in Australia, Paypass/Paywave is near ubiquitous now. I think the US is way behind in their banking infrastructure.

I used to work at the largest merchant acquirer in the US and it's funny to see people claim these features just now making it to the US were signs of innovation lacking within the US. However, the reason these features were necessary outside the US is because the risk model was more severe outside the US; there was no need to implement them here. I have a presentation from Mastercard somewhere from 2006 that showed…

Quite interesting. Do you know why credit card fraud was a bigger issue elsewhere in the world and not in the US?

Re: Privacy – Forget Your Credit Card

#325

Post by URSpider94 »

akhatri_aus wrote: post #294
dcosson wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A merchant can choose to decline prepaid debit cards, e.g. here's how the braintree api exposes it[0]. I assume that's what this shows up as. [0] https://developers.braintreepayments.com/reference/response/...

A prepaid debit card is different from a plain old 'debit card'. The debit card is accepted everywhere a credit card is (as long as it says Visa or Mastercard on it). In fact a few places accept debit cards but do not accept credit cards as fees with debit cards can be lower. There's just a handful of subscription merchants that don't take prepaid debit cards.

The problem comes with things like hotels and car rentals. For example, I'm staying in a hotel tonight, and they just authorized my credit card for $200 more than the nightly rate to cover incidentals (the notice came to my iPhone). If that were a debit card (or Privacy), they would have to pull the full amount from my checking account right away, and it could be days or weeks until they put it back. Since it's a credit card, they'll release the hold when the final bill comes through in a day or two, and I'll never know the difference.

Re: Privacy – Forget Your Credit Card

#326

Post by URSpider94 »

boling11 wrote: post #320
URSpider94 wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey, I'm all for your service. I was a big user of Discover's one-time card numbers before they went away, just for the peace of mind of not having to worry about having my card number stolen. I will very probably sign up for Privacy and use it. My point was that we have a lot of tinfoil hat crypto currency believers in the audience here tonight, and this is maybe not the panacea they were hoping for - it's not the s…

I hear ya - hope you give us a try :). Would love to get your thoughts!

Will do!

Re: Privacy – Forget Your Credit Card

#327

Post by akhatri_aus »

URSpider94 wrote: post #325
akhatri_aus wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A prepaid debit card is different from a plain old 'debit card'. The debit card is accepted everywhere a credit card is (as long as it says Visa or Mastercard on it). In fact a few places accept debit cards but do not accept credit cards as fees with debit cards can be lower. There's just a handful of subscription merchants that don't take prepaid debit cards.

The problem comes with things like hotels and car rentals. For example, I'm staying in a hotel tonight, and they just authorized my credit card for $200 more than the nightly rate to cover incidentals (the notice came to my iPhone). If that were a debit card (or Privacy), they would have to pull the full amount from my checking account right away, and it could be days or weeks until they put it back. Since it's a cre…

You can put a hold on a debit card too without pulling the entire amount (they run an authorisation and release it immediately) I've used it to rent cars and hotel rooms, they do a check but the amount isn't 'blocked' off. In effect your statement looks just like a credit card.. There's absolutely no difference except with a credit card it's a borrowed balance.

I'm not too aware of how cards are in the US but generally in Europe & Australia (afaik) they're this way. Do cheque cards have mastercard/visa on them in the US (What about maestro/electron)?

Re: Privacy – Forget Your Credit Card

#330

Post by rawfan »

boling11 wrote: post #4

Hey HN - Privacy.com co-founder here. I'm really excited to share what we've been working on for the past year and a half or so. We've been neck-deep in payments stuff on the card issuing side (getting a BIN sponsor, ACH origination, etc), so happy to answer any questions on that front as well. P.S. For new users, your first $5 donation to watsi.org is on us :)

Any plans for international expansion?
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