From: Andrew Loewenstern <andrew_loewenstern@il.us.swissbank.com>
Date: Mon, 4 Dec 95 12:52:02 PST
To: Scott Brickner <sjb@universe.digex.net>
Subject: Re: INTERNET SECURITY RISKS FOR CONSUMERS OVERBLOWN
Message-ID: <9512042051.AA00620@ch1d157nwk>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Scott Brickner writes:
>  Of course, the card company gets a big bill, and probably will try
>  to sue the site to recover, and both will pass those costs back to
                                   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>  the consumer, assuming they survive.  The total cost is still pretty
   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>  small to the individual.

You just said it right there.  The cost doesn't go away.  Just because  
individual credit card holders each only have to pay for a small fraction of  
the fraud pie doesn't make it right for executives to be saying that it is  
safe.  Any more than it is right for cellular companies to completely ignore  
security concerns because "the total cost is still pretty small to the  
individual."

The point is that these costs, no matter how small at the individual  
cardholder level, are avoidable.  Why should consumers have to pay for fraud  
that can be prevented?  By ignoring security concerns, encouraging people to  
use card numbers in an unsafe manner, and then passing the fraud burden onto  
the individual customers, card issuers will basically be stealing money from  
the consumers much in the same way that cellular telcos have been doing for  
years.


andrew