Check Your Visa Transactions On The Card Itself

from the the-smarter-card dept

Smart credit cards with built in chips never really took off in the US as was expected, but Visa is apparently experimenting with an even smarter credit card. They're testing cards that actually contain a tiny display screen on the card itself. The idea is that you could check your balance or your recent transactions directly on the card itself. The screen runs off of the smart card chip that no one was using before. Right now, they say the display-in-cards are a bit too fragile, but they expect to figure out how to make them more durable by next year. Of course, the other problem is that such tiny, flexible, durable displays built onto a credit card are going to be quite expensive. There are also some concerns about what data to show, and how to keep any sensitive data private. Perhaps this could work with the voice activated credit card everyone was talking about last week - though, you have to imagine that's only going to make the price go higher. Of course, as various wireless companies are working on ways to build payment technologies directly into the mobile phone, some may wonder why they need an actual credit card (smart or not) at all.
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  1. identicon
    EUman, 29 Apr 2004 @ 11:41pm

    Chip not used?

    Go most places in Western Europe now and you'll get handed a machine to enter a PIN number when you use your credit card - the chip most definitely is used!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    Mike (profile), 29 Apr 2004 @ 11:54pm

    Re: Chip not used?

    Note: I said in the US. It's used quite extensively in Europe and Asia.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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