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Flaw in New Visa Cards Would Let Hackers Steal $1M Per Card
New submitter biomass writes with news about a flaw in Visa's contactless card that lets anyone charge $999,999 to it. According to researchers at Newcastle University in the UK, the card system developed by VISA for use in the United Kingdom fails to recognize transactions made in non-UK foreign currencies and can therefore be tricked into approving any transaction up to 999,999.99. "With just a mobile phone we created a POS terminal that could read a card through a wallet," Martin Emms, lead researcher of the project that uncovered the flaw, noted in a statement about the findings. "All the checks are carried out on the card rather than the terminal so at the point of transaction, there is nothing to raise suspicions. By pre-setting the amount you want to transfer, you can bump your mobile against someone's pocket or swipe your phone over a wallet left on a table and approve a transaction."
fails to recognize transactions made in non-UK foreign currencies and can therefore be tricked into approving any transaction up to 999,999.99
Motherfucker, you can't read a fucking sentence into the SUMMARY!?
Up to. Meaning $0-$999,999.
Script a repeated transaction preload for $5 on a device then go wait at a chokepoint to any high traffic area. Subway, airport, shopping center, sports stadium, ect...
You could rake in quite a lot in a short timeframe doing that.
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it!
The problem is that no one wants to do a touch technique that also integrates a chip-and-pin setup. They want either mag-stripe (ie, US-style) or radio chip and pin (Europe, probably elsewhere).
If it's any consolation I'm a little bummed about the use of RFID in so many things that really should be secure, like passports. Fortunately I got mine issued in those last couple of months before they went RFID, but my wife's renewal is RFID-equipped so we had to get a faraday cage sleeve for it. Mine will expire soon enough that I'll probably also have to get a faraday cage sleeve soon.
I'd love to get one of those stainless-steel woven wallets, but I expect they're a pain in the ass to travel with, as they'll probably be searched every time they go through the X-ray machine.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Even if the transaction is 999,999.00 euros, the point remains: in all likelihood that transaction would be over the limit of 99.999% of all credit cards out there.
Also:
"Since the transaction is done offline without going through a retailer’s point-of-sale system, no other security checks are done."
How do they get at the money, however much it is, without passing it through the payment network at one point or another? It's not like there's only one check done when the card is tapped.
Woven steel passport wallet here - dump it on the x-ray belt regularly in jacket and all sorts. Been asked to walk thru with passport/boarding pass on odd occassion but just slip them out of metal sleeve for that. Wallet itself has never been a burden.
No. You didn't read TFA. The target is a contactless credit/debit card carried in the victim's wallet. The phone is used by the thief, who installs basic point-of-sale software on and then bumps it against a wallet in an attempt to relieve the victim of funds. The card is a passive device which is never 'turned off'.
Modest doubt is called the beacon of the wise. - William Shakespeare
A good majority of small transactions are never caught or challenged. Credit card thieves figured this out a long time ago when card skimmers and the internet came about. People don't really pay attention like they should.
Sounds like if you can find a store that is currently offline (which is rare) you can rip off the store for goods purchased, and that's about it.
It's useless for the thief to directly charge a card unless the thief also has a merchant account, which are not exactly trivial to sign up for, what with credit checks and all.
And these people obviously have no clue how offline transactions actually work. They're held in the POS station until they get uploaded, where they get all the normal verifications before they are processed and the money deposited in the merchant's account.
Other than ripping off a merchant in some way (and that would require a coordinated effort on the part of someone with a portable card reader and someone else at the cash register), there is no risk here whatsoever. Nothing but FUD, deliberately fostering hysteria to sell advertising. In other words, in the world of "journalism", it's a day that ends in "y".
That's why even if you have a Near Field Communications equipped card like Chase Freedom, you don't want to use it directly. Scan it once, into Apple Pay, and then use that implementation of the NFC standard to present the card to merchants without having them see your card. Apple's security is added to whatever security the credit card has, and your fingerprint is required to complete the transaction.
The lucky sod with the 0.5 VISA card is probably immune to this scam.
$
heh, I explained the exact same thing to someone on Twitter.
You would need either:
a) A portable POS with a Merchant account or
b) A portable skimmer and an accomplice in the same store from which to rip off that could make such a transaction.
c) An accomplice working for the store from which to rip off to intentionally make such charges happen.
It comes back to you're not buying a million dollars in hotdogs. At best a would-be thief could probably rip off some fast food, coffee and 7-11 type stores in broad daylight. The attack in the article would only rip off people using offline PoS, which is basically nobody except Taxi drivers and some food-cart type of kiosks.
The relay attack is more sophisticated and basically records and plays back both ends of the NFC transaction. One person picks up some stuff, and the accomplice gets in another line somewhere near the target (standing behind someone else in another checkout line) when the recording end senses a NFC card, the person with the playback end readies their "tap to pay" phone and starts the transaction, which is relayed to the recording phone, and conducts relays all the data across. Then the thieves make their get away, and the victim notices two charges from their grocery store on their bill and doesn't think too much of it, or disputes it, but would need the bank to produce the receipt to prove they didn't make the other purchase.
Or a card owner could knowingly do this, to rip off the card company. People do this all the time with online payments. The risk however is the cashier recognizing you the next time, because I assure you that any business ripped off will blame it on the cashier not paying attention and thus "retrain" everyone to look for you and have you escorted off the premises.
At the end of the day, the Apple Pay solution starts looking more attractive than ever.