[Gllug] Chip and PIN

[John Winters]

On Wed, 2006-05-10 at 15:35 +0100, t.clarke wrote:
> Just read an interesting article in the Financial Times on 'chip skimmers'
> 
> Apparently you can buy a small device for abt 55 quid which will 'skin' card
> and pin numbers from point of sale terminals.
> 
> 
> So much for the extra security of Chip and PIN it seems  !!

The articles on this incident have all been rather light on technical
detail, but it appears that what has been copied is the *mag stripe* and
the PIN.

The problem is that PINs are now much more widely used, but mag stripes
have not been taken out of use.  It's not really "Chip and PIN" which is
insecure, so much as "(Chip or mag-stripe) and PIN".

I would certainly think twice about typing my PIN into any system where
my card was swiped through a card reader.  The ones where only the end
of the card goes into a closed slot (so that the chip can be activated)
could potentially let someone discover your PIN, but there's no way they
can read your mag-stripe.

John

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