Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

By the way, had any payment system ever experimented with putting a cheap LCD display and a keypad on the card itself? Such card won't be really usable (most ATMs I've seen just gulp the whole card, although most POS terminals require inserting 2-3cm deep, just enough to connect to the chip), but as an experiment - that would probably solve many issues related to necessity to trust to terminal.


I've seen prototype NFC cards with E-ink screens and buttons that do exactly this. They can extract enough power from the NFC link to update the e-ink screen.

Doesn't solve the problem raised in this article though, which is authenticating the card. The problem is trusting the terminal you are using the card with - because the terminal is responsible for verifying that the card is genuine, a modified terminal can make any card appear as genuine.


Yeah I saw a card with a screen demoed ages ago which generated one-time-use credit card numbers (or something like that), which is surely the way it should be done. It's so crazy that once I've given someone some numbers they can just take money from me.




Consider applying for YC's Summer 2026 batch! Applications are open till May 4

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: