Topic: The Bitcoin Debit/Gift Card? (Read 2560 times)
Please let me know when you will find a solution better than one TRASTRA. Nice fees, bit and the most popular alt coins you can load directly onto a VISA card... just dropped it here cause i searched for crypto card topics and saw this forum is so outta date
Hmm, it'll be very hard for them to introduce similar level of protective technologies as in modern banknotes. Printing money (in a sense of making the bills) is hard. All those security measures are quite costly. And duplicating a piece of paper is quite easy. Also, it looks like the process of spending those bills is quite involved. You can't get exact change in bitbills and you still need a computer to transfer money. So they are kinda redundant.
Basically strong cryptography and smart devices beat paper
IMHO.
Basically strong cryptography and smart devices beat paper
IMHO. 
Bitbills was just announced. Its similar to what your talking about, its a physical gift card. It has a qr code under a scratch off hologram. No rfid chip though.
Again, skimming credit cards works, because they only contain reference to the account number or whatever. And therefore can be duplicated. With single wallet copy in secure area on the card skimming becomes useless. They might skim your pin with a camera, but without that same card it's useless. At least my proposal for bitcoin debit card tries to make it so...
If it was somthing based on challenge/response like SIM cards, the risk of cloning would be significantly reduced (AFAIK SIM cards can only be cloned if the attacker has physical access to the card itself; just by sniffing at the communication between the device holding the simcard (with bitcard the card itself would be the device, the thing the attacker would need to have access to would be sealed inside the plastic of the card) and the operator isn't enough for cloning)
I believe ArtForz is working on a secure hardware device to store private keys and sign transactions. That would eliminate the need for trust of the merchant's terminal, since the keys never leave your device.
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Has anybody ever had their bank accounts emptied after paying for groceries at their local supermarket? If a store was ever caught doing this, they wouldn't be a store for long.
Yes.The stores don't do it; it's the employees who skim or steal information. So it's the employee that would get in trouble, not the store. I've personally had my CC info stolen by a store employee before.
And it can happen at any store you shop at. Either the employee is handling the card directly and memorizes the information, swipes it below the counter, or installs a skimmer on the reader you swipe through yourself. And as pointed out, gas stations will install the skimmers right inside the machine.
Luckily U.S. credit cards are federally protected past $50, and my bank is personally happy to reverse all charges with no fee in the event of theft.
Using a non-smart-card means you would have to trust the merchant not to just take all the Bitcoins on the card. This works for gift cards that are good at a single merchant but it doesn't really work for generic currency.
Has anybody ever had their bank accounts emptied after paying for groceries at their local supermarket? If a store was ever caught doing this, they wouldn't be a store for long.
Using a non-smart-card means you would have to trust the merchant not to just take all the Bitcoins on the card. This works for gift cards that are good at a single merchant but it doesn't really work for generic currency.
Yes, but then when you pay with a bank card, you have to trust that the amount you're authorizing is the same as shown on the screen, and when you use a credit card, you have to trust the number isn't being skimmed and stored somewhere. There have been cases of people opening up gas pumps and such and installing skimmers inside the machine, so you could never tell it was there.The main thing is those machines are issued by banks, have various tamperproofing systems, and if you do get ripped off you have the bank to complain to. How do you be sure a random Bitcoin card reader is safe, and where do you go if you get scammed?
Gift cards are different from debit card. Gift card contains a reference to the money stored at the particular store/chain. Sorta like store credit. You can make arrangements with the merchant to simply buy gift cards with bitcoin, no need to keep the wallet on those cards.
And if you do simply keep the wallet there - it's insecure, because the merchant can keep both pin and wallet and use them later.
My idea is that the encryption routine is performed by the card, so when the card is gone - there's nothing the merchant can do to access your wallet.
And if you do simply keep the wallet there - it's insecure, because the merchant can keep both pin and wallet and use them later.
My idea is that the encryption routine is performed by the card, so when the card is gone - there's nothing the merchant can do to access your wallet.
Using a non-smart-card means you would have to trust the merchant not to just take all the Bitcoins on the card. This works for gift cards that are good at a single merchant but it doesn't really work for generic currency.
My idea in this thread: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/bitcoin-smartcard-point-of-sale-terminal-7539
I guess we need to pitch these ideas to people with money 
I could day dream about Bitcoin possibilities all day long...
I could day dream about Bitcoin possibilities all day long...
Check my thread on the topic (look for the one with "bitcard" on the tittle)
https://www.bitcoin.org/smf/index.php?topic=4148.0
Check my thread on the topic (look for the one with "bitcard" on the tittle)
Would be cool. Probably possible, but since it is simpler to implement a smartphone application, I doubt anyone will spend much energy/time/money in implementing a bitcoin client on a chip card.
No no, client is at the merchant end of things, the merchant who agrees to accept bitcoins.
All you have is your necessary wallet.dat file, that is it. And some trust for the merchant obviously.
Would be cool. Probably possible, but since it is simpler to implement a smartphone application, I doubt anyone will spend much energy/time/money in implementing a bitcoin client on a chip card.
Picture this: a regular swipe and/or chip plastic card that contains an encrypted wallet.dat file and requires a pin to release any funds.
The brick and mortar merchant can simply have a bitcoin client running 24/7 with an updated blockchain somewhere on their POS system.
You swipe your card, ok the amount on screen, and enter your pin number to release the funds.
Possible?
The brick and mortar merchant can simply have a bitcoin client running 24/7 with an updated blockchain somewhere on their POS system.
You swipe your card, ok the amount on screen, and enter your pin number to release the funds.
Possible?
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