Credit Card Safety - Chip And Pin Not Enough

Summary: Credit cards and debit cards are viewed as relatively secure methods of making purchases; however as with any security measure there are people who will try to find their way around it. Various increasingly complex methods have been devised to access bank accounts by obtaining the consumer's details such as scanning and copying the electronic strip on the back of the card to create duplicates which can be used to siphon off funds. Chip and Pin was devised as a means of mak...

Credit cards and debit cards are viewed as relatively secure methods of making purchases; however as with any security measure there are people who will try to find their way around it. Various increasingly complex methods have been devised to access bank accounts by obtaining the consumer's details such as scanning and copying the electronic strip on the back of the card to create duplicates which can be used to siphon off funds. Chip and Pin was devised as a means of making it much harder for criminals to make useable copies of bank or credit cards, and so significantly reduce the security risks surrounding card transactions in the UK. The system has been hailed as a major step in crime reduction. According to consumer finance comparison site Moneynet (http://www.moneynet.co.uk ), "the introduction of Chip & PIN has contributed to the rising popularity of debit and credit cards. Two-thirds (63 per cent) of people surveyed by A&L say they prefer to pay by plastic on most occasions and 11 per cent attribute this to Chip & PIN." Unfortunately, after only a few months since the compulsory universal conversion of all cards in the UK to the chip and pin system, stories are now emerging of ways which the chip and pin security is being breached. The petrol station giant, Shell, has recently suspended all chip-and-pin payments in 600 of its UK petrol stations following the fraudulent removal of over