Skip to main content

Losing contact (with reality)

According to a number of press report, the Abu Dhabi police are warning local residents that money may be stolen from their bank balances through “electronic magnetisation” and "exploitation of contactless payment technology”. I’m pretty sure that I would be concerned about electronic magnetisation too (if I knew what it was) so I will take this warning to wary to heart the next time I visit. The magnitude of the problem must be such that there is general panic amongst the contactless crazy residents of the… oh, wait. It turns out that Colonel Amran Ahmed Al Mazrouei, Abu Dhabi’s director of criminal investigations, has said that "although such thefts were possible, none has so far been recorded in the emirate".

To the best of my knowledge, none have so far been recorded anywhere else either. When I went to look for evidence of criminal enterprise, I came across yet another alarming statement. According to The Paypers, fraudsters are now using ‘contactless skimming’ machines to read credit card information "right out of your pocket” and then use a merchant account (not sure what they mean by this) to make contactless payments. The article goes on to note that “in a 2013 study published by the University of Surrey, a team managed to ‘successfully receive contactless transmission from distances of 18 to 31 inches’ using a skimming device".

Wow.

That sounds amazing. I’m astonished that banks could be irresponsible to issue contactless card at all if they are so prone to fraud and they must withdraw them… oh, wait. It turns out that of you read to the end of this paper, you will see… "This work was funded by EPSRC and Consult Hyperion".

Ah.

Indeed it was. And it was a brilliant piece of work which included some innovative engineering. You’ll particularly like the bit about using a shopping trolley as an eavesdropping device. But if you read our Tomorrow’s Transactions blog about this in detail, you will find that “Just as when we did the original risk analysis on contactless in 2007, the conclusion is that contactless bank cards are fit for purpose”. Sorry to disappoint, but the sky isn’t falling in, no matter what the papers (or the Paypers) say!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Financial Cryptography: Corda Day - a new force

Forum friend Ian Grigg, who I always take very seriously indeed on any such topic, wrote about Corda on his blog and concluded with a powerful statement. Bitcoin told the users it wanted an unstoppable currency - sure, works for a small group but not for the mass market. Ethereum told their users they need an unstoppable machine - which worked how spectacularly with the DAO? Not. What. We. Wanted. Corda is the only game in town because it's the only one that asked the users. It's that simple. From Financial Cryptography: Corda Day - a new force xxx It seems to me, however, what Ian is pointing to as the greatest strength of their approach is also the greatest weakness. A staple feature of unimaginative management consultants presentations about innovation is some variation on the statement by Henry Ford that if you had asked users what they wanted, they would have asked for faster horses coupled with some variation on the statement by Steve jobs that it was pointless ask...

Barclays slated after CIO takes a year to open a bank account

xxx The rigorous KYC procedures at US banks the New Jersey-based crime ring created more than 7,000 fake identities to get tens of thousands of credit cards From  Woman Gets 3 Years for Role in $200M Credit Card Fraud Scam - ABC News xxx xxxx Barclays slated after CIO takes a year to open a bank account : "An adviser to a new charitable incorporated organisation that spent more than a year trying to open a bank account has blasted Barclays for its onerous demands and disproportionate due diligence." xxx In a recent survey for VocaLink, some two-thirds of respondents said that they saw value in the establishment of a central KYC utility. They are wrong. We don’t need a central KYC utility, we need a federated reputation infrastructure. Or, to put it another way, a financial services passport ( as I mentioned earlier in the year ).

There is no excuse for not taking cards

So we went to the pub. For lunch. Seven of us. Say £20 per head. £100+ quid. Say £50 quid gross for the pub. Colleague goes to order food and drinks and pay at the bar. Apologetic barmaid comes over to explain that their “card machine” is down, so she can only accept cash. Under normal circumstances I would have simply walked out, feeling it wholly inappropriate to reward such a poorly managed establishment and, as a functioning actor in a capitalist economy, done my duty to depress their lunchtime takings. Here’s what we wanted to say: This is absurd. This is 2016 not 1916. Your card machine is down? Well, so what! Are you seriously telling me that mein host has no mobile phone number capable of registering for PingIt or PayM? That none of the staff or the pub itself have a PayPal account that I can send the money to? That neither the owners nor managers not contingency planners thought to tuck an iZettle behind the bar to use when the clunky and expensive GPRS terminal fails for o...