almost all security is cost/benefit trade-off.
hardware token chips are somewhat analogous to bank vaults .... if the bank vault contains enuf value and somebody is motivated enuf ... they will attempt to find some way to extract the value. This can be either by attacking the vault directly ... or by attacking the infrastructure associated with the vault. I don't believe anybody contends that bank vaults are absolutely impregnable. the following are discussion of upgrading a magstrip payment card (debit, credit, gift, etc) with a chip and requiring (x9.59) digital signed transactions. http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm2.htm#straw http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm2.htm#strawm1 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm2.htm#strawm2 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm2.htm#strawm3 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm2.htm#strawm4 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsmore.htm#bioinfo1 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsmore.htm#bioinfo2 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsmore.htm#bioinfo3 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay3.htm#passwords http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay3.htm#x959risk1 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay3.htm#x959risk2 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay3.htm#x959risk3 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay3.htm#x959risk4 The issue is that the chip is used to do financial transactions ... which have some "credit limit" characteristics, various types of fraud pattern analysis, capable of reporting card lost/stolen within reasonable period of time, etc. The position is that even w/o PIN &/or biometric controlled chip .... it is still better than today's world where counterfeiting magstripe operation is relatively easy. At least the actual chip card has to be stolen ... as opposed to being able to harvest several hundred thousand credit card account numbers from some webserver and execute large number of fraudulent transactions w/o much additional effort. With a chip having some form of PIN &/or biometric control, then even stealing the card isn't sufficient, the chip actually has to be subverted/compromised. The issue then is 1) the cost of stealing the card, 2) cost of performing the compromise operation 3) can the compromise be performed before the card has been reported lost/stolen, 4) can a compromised chip be actually used before the card has been reported lost/stolen. Reversing the question, can a chip be added to an existing magstripe card .... and does the increased effort required to compromise such a chip (compared to compromise/counterfeit magstripe) reduce fraud sufficiently to justify the cost of the chip (and any associated chip acceptor device infrastructure). misc. card fraud discussion http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm6.htm#terror7 [FYI] Did Encryption Empower These Terrorists? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm6.htm#terror14 [FYI] Did Encryption Empower These Terrorists? (addenda to chargebacks) http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm7.htm#pcards4 FW: The end of P-Cards? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm7.htm#auth2 Who or what to authenticate? (addenda) http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm7.htm#rubberhose Rubber hose attack http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm7.htm#rhose4 Rubber hose attack http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm7.htm#rhose5 when a fraud is a sale, Re: Rubber hose attack http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm9.htm#carnivore Shades of FV's Nathaniel Borenstein: Carnivore's "Magic Lantern" http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsm10.htm#risks credit card & gift card fraud (from today's comp.risks) http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aadsmore.htm#debitfraud Debit card fraud in Canada http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay6.htm#fraud Online Card Fraud Thirty Times That Offline http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay6.htm#ccfraud2 "out of control credit card fraud" http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay6.htm#ccfraud3 "out of control credit card fraud" http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay8.htm#ccfraud Almost Half UK E-Shopper's Fear Card Fraud (CC fraud increased by 50% in 2k) http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay8.htm#ccfraud2 Statistics for General and Online Card Fraud http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay8.htm#x959paper Credit Card Fraud and E-Commerce: A Case Study http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay9.htm#risks credit card & gift card fraud (from today's comp.risks) http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay9.htm#skim High-tech Thieves Snatch Data >From ATMs (including PINs) http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay10.htm#3 High-tech Thieves Snatch Data >From ATMs (including PINs) http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/aepay10.htm#6 credit card & gift card fraud (from today's comp.risks) http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001c.html#73 PKI and Non-repudiation practicalities http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001f.html#40 Remove the name from credit cards! http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001g.html#38 distributed authentication http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001h.html#67 Would this type of credit card help online shopper to feel more secure? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001h.html#68 Net banking, is it safe??? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001h.html#75 Net banking, is it safe??? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001j.html#9 E-commerce security???? http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001m.html#4 Smart Card vs. Magnetic Strip Market random refs: http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001h.html#61 Security Proportional To Risk http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/subtopic.html#fraud Risk, Fraud, Exploits http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/index.html#x959 X9.59 financial industry standard digital signed transactions --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to [EMAIL PROTECTED]