Chip vs. magnet

Hi, Habramir!
You won't be surprised anyone with a bank card for a long time - it has ceased to be an indicator of “steepness” and now almost everyone has it. But few people know that in its development it has come a long way. Appearing in 1914 in the form of self-made cardboard from Mobil Oil, and passing through the wilds of evolution through metal plates with extruded letters and symbols, modern plastic cards have become an indispensable attribute of everyday life for most of us.
But the possibility is not excluded that cards with a magnetic strip will also soon become nothing more than an anachronism a relic of the past. To whom, if not you, habra people, to know that technologies do not stand still, chip cards are already gaining popularity.
Russian banks now issue only combined cards (combining both a magnetic stripe and a chip). This is connected, as usual, with the lack of infrastructure: not all devices in our country are able to read information from the chip. But this problem is being solved: payment systems strongly encourage banks to switch to cards with chips.
Immediately I must say that the design and maintenance of the chip card for the client, as a rule, is no more expensive than cards with a magnetic stripe. Although for the bank it is, of course, more expensive.
The main advantage of chip cards over magnetic stripe cards is increased security. If the information is encrypted in a magnetic strip, it is easy for a scammer to copy it and make a duplicate card. It is almost impossible to count information from a chip, and even if it can be done, this is a completely useless exercise. The point is this. If fraudsters read information from a magnetic strip of your card and performed an operation through a terminal that does not read the chip, but works on a magnetic strip, you can protest such an operation through your issuing bank (the bank that issued your card). Of course, you will receive a refund only if the investigation of the bank proves that you are really a victim, and not a rogue who tried to deceive the bank.
Another advantage of chip cards is the ability to write additional applications to the chip (fuel, transport, and others). It is very convenient - such a card can be used not only for cashless payment, but also to get different “buns” from its use. In Europe, cards with contactless chips (NFC technology) are also gaining momentum. With their help, you can pay for goods and services by simply bringing the card to a special terminal. You and I can only believe and wait for the progress to reach us. But we are no strangers ... Soon, these technologies will become available to us too .
It would be dishonest to tell you about the “advantages” of chip cards and keep silent about the “minuses”. The chip card will not protect you from fraud when performing transactions on the Internet. Therefore, it is better to have a virtual card for this purpose. Also, when dealing with a chip card, be prepared for a longer wait for a terminal transaction or manual entry of a PIN code, which not all of us always remember. But these are such trifles - safety is paramount!
By the way, if you inadvertently come to France with a magnetic stripe card, you will have to really try (perhaps, make a couple of “extra” walking tours around the city) to find an ATM where you can get cash, or a shop (cafe, restaurant, hairdresser’s) ) where it will be possible to pay her. France is the first country that almost completely switched to chip cards, and there it is already very difficult to find a device that accepts magnetic stripe cards. In Russia, on the other hand, foreigners with chip cards will be ill, we have no appropriate infrastructure to serve them.