If you haven’t already, expect to receive new EMV-chip credit and debit cards from your card issuers.
The name EMV comes from its original developers, Europay, MasterCard, and Visa. The difference between chip cards and traditional magnetic stripe cards is the computer chip on the front of the EMV card. These chip cards are inserted into EMV-enabled terminals at point of sale and left there until the transaction is complete. Because not all merchants or ATMs have chip-enabled terminals, most EMV-chip cards also still have magnetic stripes.
EMV technology uses dynamic authentication, which makes it more difficult for criminals to access your account information. Each in-person transaction at an EMV-enabled terminal uses a unique code that cannot be used for other card transactions. That said, online transactions will continue to be processed the usual way, though strides are being taken to improve the security of these transactions, as well.
Some other options that are coming available for shopping online and on the go are:
Apple Pay
Released in October 2014, Apple Pay is a free mobile payment and digital wallet service that lets you make payments with your credit or debit cards by holding your iPhone or Apple Watch up to a point-of-sale system that accepts Apple Pay.
If you have an iPhone 6 (or newer) or Apple Watch, you’ll input your credit and/or debit card number into the service. When you make a payment with this service, Apple Pay utilizes tokenization process in which the card networks — Visa, MasterCard, or American Express — assign a unique Device Account Number that essentially replaces the actual account number. As a result of this tokenization by the networks, merchants never receive your actual account number.
Additionally, Apple allows you to remotely lock your device if it is lost or stolen.
Android Pay
Android Pay is a free mobile payment system for Android users that allows you to pay for merchandise in stores with your credit and debit cards by holding your phone up to a merchant’s payment terminal that accepts Android Pay.
You’ll download the application on your phone, then add your credit or debit card information. When you make a payment with this service, Android Pay uses a virtual account number rather than sending your actual credit or debit information to the merchant.
Visa Checkout
Visa Checkout is a payment service for online shopping. A growing number of online retailers participate in this service, with the main benefit being you can check out more easily and securely at participating sites. Even though it is a Visa product, a user can add any other non-Visa branded credit or debit cards.
With Visa Checkout, you set up an account with Visa where you can store your credit and/or debit card information, along with related information such as shipping addresses. Once you’ve stored this information, you can quickly pay for your purchase at any of the many online outlets that offer Visa Checkout by clicking the Visa Checkout button at payment.
All of these payment options can help make online or in-store shopping more convenient and secure. And you will be seeing more people waving their phones or inserting a card when checking out at retailers soon.
