Vermont Business Magazine Attorney General William Sorrell joined with eight other state attorneys general in urging leadership of the nation's largest credit card issuers to speed up implementation of chip and PIN technology, which is widely considered a more secure means of processing credit card transactions than that used with traditional magnetic-stripe payment cards.
The major credit card companies, including MasterCard, Visa, Discover Financial Services, Bank of America, Capital One, Citigroup, American Express and JP Morgan Chase, have collectively begun the nationwide transition to a system where cards contain chips and consumers must provide a signature to authenticate the transaction. The attorneys general are asking company leaders to move as soon as possible to a technology that requires that a transaction require both a card with a chip but also a customer PIN in lieu of the customer signature. Global experience shows that consumer credit card information is less likely to be compromised when a PIN, as opposed to a signature, is used with CHIP technology. Local businesses will benefit as the enhanced technology will minimize both possible harm to their reputations and loss of consumer trust as well as the financial risk that arises when their customers’ information is co-opted.
“I applaud the industry’s recent move to providing CHIP technology to its credit card holders. Adding the PIN feature, the standard used throughout the world, will provide consumers even more security than a signature. Signatures are easily forged and often not even reviewed during a credit card transaction. Consumers deserve the most secure technology up front to avoid the many headaches and financial risks down the road that occur when a card is compromised and cancelled through no fault of the consumer,” said Attorney General Sorrell.
Attorneys general from Connecticut, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and the District of Columbia joined in the letter.
Vermont AG: Nov 19, 2015