October 30, 2006
MasterCard Contactless Payment Tech Wins Award
MasterCard was awarded the honors of 2006 Frost & Sullivan Company of the Year for its PayPass contactless payment technology. The technology is being used in the new contactless credits cards from Mastercard. [via Contactless News]
MasterCard was one of the companies listed in a recent NY Times article about the findings of two US researchers regarding the security flaws in 20 contactless credit cards tested. The researchers found that not only could they "skim" important information off the cards while they were still in their envelopes, they could do so with a homemade reader, which cost US$150 to make. They also determined that a smaller reader could be made for only $50 and read information through a mailbox, from a distance of a few feet.
Several credit card companies have claimed that any information skimmed off the cards tested cannot be used successfully to make purchases. Although the whole issue begs the question of why the cards are not mailed with an anti-RF sleeve to at least give them impression that they are protecting consumers from all possibilities of fraud.
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