You may or may not have heard by now, but the credit card industry in the United States is moving over to what is known as EMV chip-enabled credit cards. You might have even received your replacement card in the mail by now, and may have already experienced the new way of paying in some stores that use updated credit card swiping equipment.
What are EMV Chip-Enabled Credit Cards?
EMV stands for “Europay, Mastercard, and Visa”, and utilizes a special computer microchip to authenticate purchases made by the card. In other words, EMV chip-enabled credit cards have an extra security measure in place to help prevent someone from stealing your card and to prevent credit card fraud. These cards still have the magnetic strip on the back, which will still work if the retail establishment you are visiting does not yet have the technology to read the special EMV chip inside your card.
How is EMV different than traditional magnetic strip cards?
With traditional credit cards with just the magnetic strip on the back, whenever you swipe your card at the register, there is a certain amount of data that is transferred from the card to the merchant that never changes. So, a thief or fraudster could in theory just need to steal your data on one random occasion and be able to use your credit card account over and over again.
However, with the EMV cards, the data that is transferred from your card to the merchant changes every single time you swipe your card. Therefore, if a thief tries to steal this data, when they go to use it again for their own fraudulent purposes, it will not work and they will not be able to use your card, since the data has already been used once and cannot be used again.
Therefore, this new technology makes it much harder for credit card thieves to steal your information and wreak havoc on your credit!
How do you use the EMV card?
Not all merchants are equipped with the new readers for the cards yet, so for those places, you’ll just swipe your card like any other using the magnetic strip.
For those merchants that have the right technology, you’ll see a new slot in the bottom of the card scanner where you need to insert your card following the instructions on the machine. Unlike the swiping method, you’ll actually leave your card in the machine for a few seconds and once the transaction is approved, it will tell you to remove your card.
Want more information?
Discover is one of many credit card companies that are excited to share this new technology with consumers. If you have more questions about EMV technology, the massive shift toward having every single credit card equipped with this technology, or if you want to just watch some videos on how to use the cards before you have to use them yourself, check out their EMV Resource Center online to find the answers to all your questions and concerns.
