> That begs the question It raises the question, not begs it. To beg the question is to engage in circular reasoning. > - the added security is deemed too har

> That begs the question It raises the question, not begs it. To beg the question is to engage in circular reasoning. > - the added security is deemed too hard for a large part of the population, and would raise support cost too much I think that this is a big part of it. There's also the fact that really, cryptographically-secure cards cost more, and that someone would have to pay for the readers themselves, and (I believe) there's no infrastructure in place to prevent evil-retailer.invalid from charging one's card for more than one actually wanted to authorise. With the rise of cell phones, I think that there's a real opportunity to build cryptographically-secure payment and identity protocols. A smartphone is, after all, a general-purpose computer that fits in one's pocket. The tough part isn't implementing the protocols; it's defining them, and making them user-friendly.