Problems
Another problem of smart cards may be the failure rate. The plastic card in which the chip is embedded is fairly flexible, and the larger the chip, the higher the probability of breaking. Smart cards are often carried in wallets or pockets — a fairly harsh environment for a chip. However, for large banking systems, the failure-management cost can be more than offset by the fraud reduction. A card enclosure may be used as an alternative to help prevent the smart card from failing.
Using a smart card for mass transit presents a risk for privacy, because such a system enables the mass transit operator (and the authorities) to track the movement of individuals. In Finland, the Data Protection Ombudsman prohibited the transport operator YTV from collecting such information, in spite of YTV's argument that the owner of the card has the right to get a list of journeys paid with the card. Prior to this, such information was used in the investigation of the Myyrmanni bombing.
Contactless technology does not necessarily prevent use of a PIN for authentication of the user, but it is common for low value transactions (bank credit or debit card purchase, or public transport fare payment) not to require a PIN. This may make such cards more likely to be stolen, or used fraudulently by the finder of someone else's lost card.
Read more about this topic: Contactless Smart Card
Famous quotes containing the word problems:
“Sustained unemployment not only denies parents the opportunity to meet the food, clothing, and shelter needs of their children but also denies them the sense of adequacy, belonging, and worth which being able to do so provides. This increases the likelihood of family problems and decreases the chances of many children to be adequately prepared for school.”
—James P. Comer (20th century)
“The mother’s and father’s attitudes toward the child correspond to the child’s own needs.... Mother has the function of making him secure in life, father has the function of teaching him, guiding him to cope with those problems with which the particular society the child has been born into confronts him.”
—Erich Fromm (1900–1980)
“The proper method of philosophy consists in clearly conceiving the insoluble problems in all their insolubility and then in simply contemplating them, fixedly and tirelessly, year after year, without any hope, patiently waiting.”
—Simone Weil (1909–1943)