Fuel station owners might be rejoicing at the news from Visa that they’ll have an additional three years to install payment terminals capable of handling more secure chip-based cards.
But it’s likely bad news for Americans who are increasingly falling victim to fraudsters who install card-skimming devices at the pump.
Prior to the announcement, gas stations had until Oct. 1, 2017 to install the new technology. If they didn’t have them in place, they’d be “on the hook to absorb 100 percent of the costs of fraud associated with transactions in which the customer presented a chip-based card yet was not asked or able to dip the chip (currently, card-issuing banks eat most of the fraud costs from fuel skimming),” according to a story by Krebs on Security. “The chip card technology standard, also known as EMV (short for Europay, MasterCard and Visa) makes credit and debit cards far more expensive and difficult for thieves to clone.”
A statement from Visa explaining the decision attributed the extension to the fuel segments “unique challenges”:
“We knew that the AFD segment would need more time to upgrade to chip because of the complicated infrastructure and specialized technology required for fuel pumps. For instance, in some cases, older pumps may need to be replaced before adding chip readers, requiring specialized vendors and breaking into concrete. Furthermore, five years after announcing our liability shift, there are still issues with a sufficient supply of regulatory-compliant EMV hardware and software to enable most upgrades by 2017.”
The Krebs story cites some telling statistics on just how much the upgrades will cost businesses:
“The National Association of Convenience Stores estimates that station operators will spend approximately $30,000 per store to accommodate chip readers, and that the total cost to the fuel industry could exceed $4 billion.”
In its statement, Visa says that fraud rates at fuel pumps are relatively low: “approximately 1.3 percent of total U.S. payment fraud.”
In the interim period, Visa promises to closely monitor the AFD fraud trends and continue to work with fuel merchants, certification vendors and software suppliers to ensure EMV chip migration efforts continue.”
How can you protect yourself from being skimmed at the pump?
- Never use a debit card at the pump, as skimming devices can steal the PINs as well, which means thieves could potentially clone the card and then drain your bank account at the ATM.
- Thieves tend to favor stations that don’t have basic security standards in place, like cameras.
- They also target pumps that are closest to the road. Keep this in mind when choosing which pump to use.
Read more about the story at https://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/12/visa-delays-chip-deadline-for-pumps-to-2020/#more-37143
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Image: Pixabay