Contactless Chip Cards as an Alternative to End-to-End Encryption
The Smart Card Alliance has published a new position paper titled “End-to-End Encryption and Chip Cards in the U.S. Payments Industry" that "proposes an alternative to end-to-end encryption, protecting cardholder data by using chip card technology, but in a different way than has been considered in the past."
Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the Smart Card Alliance, said "In our paper we discuss a different approach optimized for the U.S. payment market: using contactless chip cards, including a dynamic cryptogram with each transaction and authorizing transactions online. This stands in sharp contrast to previous considerations of implementing 'chip and PIN' based on the full EMV standard. Instead, this proposal builds on what is already happening in the U.S. -- the issuance and merchant acceptance of contactless cards -- while keeping in step with globally interoperable EMV standards."
“Implementing end-to-end encryption is not a panacea; in fact, it may be more akin to putting a steel door on a grass hut,” said Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the Smart Card Alliance. “Experience shows that despite incredible investments by merchants and acquirers to secure cardholder information, we have not put an end to data breaches and fraud. Criminals just find other ways to steal cardholder data in order to clone magnetic stripe-based cards and make fraudulent transactions. Before the stakeholders take another giant step down a new path of more complicated data security requirements, we thought it would be valuable for the Smart Card Alliance to take a close look at what problems it would solve, and what it would not.”
Add your comment... (note that all comments are reviewed before they're published)