alt Hacker NewsIf 3D secure was mandatory everywhere that would help a lot, but if I understand correctly, it’s not really used in the US and with them being so big, card issuers are largely forced to allow non 3D secure requests or their clients will be unable to use their cards for too many things.
So an enormously good anti-fraud mechanism is severely handicapped.
It’s really frustrating for most of the rest of the world.
I don’t get it, do US citizens prefer being defrauded over what is perceived as a slight inconvenience?
Even for non-victims of fraud, they still pay for the fraud as all merchants up the prices of their goods to cover fraud costs/insurance.
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FWIW, HSBC USA Mastercard uses 3D secure if it's something you want and you're in the states.
> I don’t get it, do US citizens prefer being defrauded over what is perceived as a slight inconvenience?
Do you think we are requesting to have less secure payment methods or something?
No, we don't "prefer to get defrauded", but things like this are a matter of negotiation between the card issuers and the merchants.
How much is lost to fraud that would be prevented by 3d secure, 0.1%?
No, the laws are different- and more consumer friendly in the US- so the US consumer behavior is different.
Back when credit cards were first starting out (which happened in the US) the US Congress passed a law- the Fair Credit Billing Act of 1974- that consumers were only liable for $50 of losses as long as they reported the missing credit card within 60 days of the end of the fraudulent billing cycle. This was back when credit cards purchases were all made on paper with the machine that went "kachunk" and transferred a carbon copy of your card- everything was done completely offline. That law has not been changed, in fact, most banks completely waive the $50 and don't hold card-holders liable for anything reported (basically, annoying a customer over $50 isn't worth it to the bank). Thanks to the internet, suddenly cards got a lot easier to steal and a lot easier to exploit- but banks are still on the hook for all losses reported within 60 days of the end of the cycle. The result is that American banks have invested an enormous amount in real-time monitoring of credit card transactions, and are doing lots of stuff to monitor this- they care deeply since ultimately they are on the hook- but the consumer doesn't care. This is why US card's from the consumer perspective are so much laxer, because our banks have invested far more on the back-end because the consumer is held harmless in a way they aren't with European cards.
As a totally separate issue, the EU has regulated the amount of interchange fees that card-companies can charge, but the US has not capped them. The result is that US card-holders can get significant kickbacks for using cards (especially true for the top decile of wealth), in a way that is functionally impossible with EU issued cards that have capped interchange fees. There is a big lawsuit happening now to try and allow merchants to only accept low-fee cards (the standard VISA/MC/AMEX deal requires treating all cards equally, which gives them an incentive to push people to higher interchange cards). We will see what happens with that suit, but until then, American high-spenders can have much higher rewards on their cards, which also encourages greater use of the cards- and making them have less friction than the EU versions.