Links in “Credit/Debit Cards”

CFPB publishes advisory to help consumers protect themselves in the wake of the recent breaches of payment card and other data. Promotion of key actions in event of compromised information provided. [1/28]

Smartcards, with their microchips on their face and the required four-digit PIN code for in-person purchases, may be long overdue in this country, but even they wouldn't have prevents the theft of shoppers' credit card information in the latest breaches at Target and Neiman Marcus. [1/28]

Wall Street Journal article describes efforts by Visa to use big data techniques to identify at least $2 billion of fraud activity annually before the money was lost. [1/27]

Study shows credit card fraud is highly pervasive, but banks top retailers in prevention, detection and resolution, indicating "inattention to factors that could help to lower" the overall incidence of card fraud on the part of retailers. [1/24]

Industry observer spells out three reasons Europay, Mastercard, and Visa (EMV) chip-and-PIN cards that are used in much of the world will be adopted by U.S. market by 2015. [1/22]

It appears that the judges on the bench of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia are open to taking a harder look at the lower court decision that overturned the Federal Reserve Board’s rule that placed a cap on debit card fees. The card industry emphasized that consumers have not seen the pricing benefits promised by the merchants. [1/20]

It appears that the primary lesson learned from the Target breach is that that financial institutions need to take early, proactive measures. Those credit unions that informed their members and reissued cards immediately on hearing about the breach are incurring less fraud loss than they had anticipated. [1/13]

National Retail Federation says the settlement, reached last month between nine retailers and Visa and MasterCard, was rejected by the vast majority of 8,000 retailers, and that the group of nine does not represent the industry as a whole. NRF has filed an appeal. [1/6]

Target has already been hit with three class action lawsuits and is being questioned by attorneys general in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York and South Dakota. The breach has called into question the use of magnetic stripes on the back of cards, which is seen as antiquated technology.  Credit union leagues and security experts are urging the industry to adopt chip and pin technology, which is less vulnerable to breaches. [12/26]

American Express settles allegations that it used to deceptive marketing and unfair billing practices in selling credit card add-on products to its customers. $59.5 million will go to restitution to customers and $16.2 million will to go three separate penalties to the CFPB, the FDIC and the OCC. [12/26]