USA Today on Fear of Credit Cards over Net

[Perry E. Metzger]

Re: The risk of credit cards.

I suppose that indeed there are large risks elsewhere in the credit
card system. However, I think that the credit card system itself is
stupid and insecure and ought to be scrapped -- sending around account
numbers as magic keys to get payment is a stupid move. Its not
suprising how large credit card fraud is.

One of the great hopes I have for cryptographic technology is its
ability to lower the incidence of fraud, and thus lower transaction
costs a lot. Someday, hopefully, everyone will be able to be a credit
card merchant because you won't have to trust the merchants not to
steal.

Perry