It used to be that the stereotypical U.S. tourist was the one wearing the white sneakers, shorts, and a fanny pack.  Oh, and don’t forget the giant camera. Today, you can recognize them in other parts of the world as the folks trying to pay with the antiquated magnetic stripe cards instead of the more [...]

In what is undoubtedly one of the biggest stories to hit the payments industry so far this year, Global Payments has confirmed that it was the victim of a data breach in January and February which compromised the security of millions of credit card details. As reported by Brian Krebs on Friday, the breach affects [...]

Recent Nilson Report fraud numbers show that the United States accounts for 47 percent of global fraud, even though it generates only 27 percent of the total volume of purchase transactions. Alarming, right?  Still, I haven’t seen very much media coverage of this news. What has generated a lot of coverage recently is the “Biggest ID [...]

Remember a few weeks ago when I applauded Visa for announcing plans to accelerate the migration to EMV chip technology and the adoption of mobile payments?  Since then, I have been struck by a few stories in the news that really drive home what this migration will mean for the United States. First, this story [...]

You might recall my blog last month, “When in Rome, Have Your Card Declined,” when I lamented about the United States not following the rest of the world with EMV payment technology. Well, it looks like that is about to change. Last week, Visa announced plans to accelerate the migration to EMV chip technology and the adoption of mobile payments.

For years, analysts and banking experts have been predicting that countries that move to EMV would likely see a decrease in card fraud; as a result, card fraud would migrate to areas that still maintain mag stripe technology.

They say “when in Rome, do as the Romans do,” but on my last trip to Rome, that wasn’t so easy. I was in Rome, but unlike the citizens, I could not get cash out of an ATM because my magnetic stripe card wasn’t accepted. Some of the walk-up street access ATMs would only accept EMV chip credit and debit cards.

UNFCU and Gemalto celebrate the first year since the launch of United Nations Federal Credit Union’s (UNFCU) globally compliant chip and PIN credit cards with newly released results of the financial cooperative’s effectiveness study.