Armourcard and your Credit Cards

The new wave of RFID enabled credit cards and what you should know and why you need Credit Card Protection.

If you are looking for a new credit card you will no doubt come across the new wave of credit cards that are rolling out globally with the latest “wave & go” technology inside. What you need to be aware of with this technology, or Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID), is that the RFID technology can be compromised by criminals using the very same technology that the institutions are rolling out.

RFID enabled Credit Cards - Get protection from RFID by its nature, is the process of transmitting a signal wirelessly via a RFID reader to a RFID enabled device such as your credit cards and debit cards that are RFID ready.

To find out more about RFID and the vulnerabilities go here.

Are the financial institutions aware of the vulnerabilities?

Watch this video, and you be the judge…!


Learn about some of the security measures the banks are using below:

We applaud the financial institutions for stepping up security, such as offering to cover any fiscal fraud incurred by using the “Tap & Go” payment facilities. The banks limit the transaction amount to under $100 in most cases, again a good measure, but it also says to us:

“We (the financial institutions) realise that there are vulnerabilities surrounding the adoption of this ‘tap & go’ or contact-less technology, but we have invested millions globally in rolling it out so as to minimise the concern of the customers we will limit the transaction amount and guarantee on the fiscal fraud incurred.”

If this technology was totally secure then why not allow the card user to make a larger purchase amount just like a normal credit card transaction?

It’s not JUST the money, its YOUR IDENTITY data that the banks don’t give you a guarantee on protecting!

Credit Cards that are RFID enabled need ARMOURCARD to protect themThe banks and card issuers also employ encryption on all the data, which again is a great security measure by them, however if you do a Google search on RFID credit card hacking you will see articles from both security experts and the hacking community showing you how easy it is to hack the encryption on credit cards.*

The financial institutions also claim they add a unique transaction I.D. to every transmission for your protection, but again it is shown that all it takes is a hacker with a RFID reader (purchased off ebay for under $100) to program the device and undertake multiple ‘pings’ of the credit cards at one time.?They then transmit this data live to another person who uses it to pump your cards with that transaction ID attached to it.

Instead of just $100 fraud, it can now be thousands of dollars using the multiple ‘ping’ hack to gain multiples of transaction Id’s. This can be perpetrated in seconds.

Its not just about the money! It is, more importantly, about the illegal acquisition of your personal identity data that is the risk to you!

We don’t see the institutions giving you a guarantee on the security of your personal data!

Again, we must stress that the security measures undertaken by the organisations are useful, however we at Armourcard did not want to blindly leave our personal data to chance. Do you?

 Do you believe the financial organizations OR the hacking community?

We at Armourcard did not want to leave the protection of our personal details to chance. That is why we developed Armourcard which offers active RFID protection to cover your credit cards.

ARMOURCARD offers another line of defence to protect your data. You simply place ARMOURCARD inside your wallet or purse along with your other RFID enabled credit cards.

When a RFID reader tries to communicate with your credit cards, ARMOURCARD powers up instantly and jams the RFID signal. This disallows any communication from the RFID reader or the RFID enabled cards. It’s that simple!

Does ARMOURCARD still allow you the convenience to be able to use the “Wave & Go” payment terminals?

YES, that is correct!

Not only do you get active RFID protection when you need it, you also still get to use the convenience of the tap & go payment terminals.

The reason you are still able to use your cards is built into every ARMOURCARD.

There is a skin sensitive capacity switch (the gold button on the face of the ARMOURCARD) and once you place your finger or thumb on this switch it will temporarily disable ARMOURCARD‘s jamming signal and allow you to ‘Tap & Go’ as normal with your RFID enabled credit cards.

That means you get the best of both; Active RFID Protection & the convenience to still use the payment terminals when you want to.

Source:

Forbes Article – Hacker’s demo shows how easily credit cards can be read through cloths and wallets

*Recursion Ventures security researcher and Chief Hacker Kristin Paget, report Credit Card Fraud, The Contactless Generation. Please note Kristin Paget does not sponsor or officially endorse this website or product, we have only referenced a report that is freely available online to download and read. All credit for the report and its findings go to Kristin Paget.