Have you ever ordered something online and then had a pop-up window appear that asks if you want to save your credit card information for future purchases?
If you say “yes,” then the next time you go shopping on that website, you won’t have to enter in your credit card number and address. All of your information will be right there ready for you. It’s convenient and can make online shopping a breeze.
But it can also open up a whole new world of problems. If someone gets a hold of this information, they can wreak havoc on your credit score and cause you all sorts of headaches.
Virtual Credit Card Numbers Can Help You Shop Securely
Fortunately, there’s another way to shop online without having to worry about security issues: virtual credit card numbers. These are temporary numbers that you can use instead of your actual credit card number to make purchases. While many credit cards offer this service for free, American Express offers it free as part of every one of their cards.
What Are The Benefits Of Using Virtual Credit Card Numbers?
By using virtual credit card numbers, you get all the convenience of shopping online without worrying about identity theft or fraud. For example:
If a website is hacked or has security issues, hackers still won’t
A major component of online shopping is the ability to make purchases with credit cards, and if you’re going to use them online, you should know about virtual credit cards.
Virtual credit card numbers are a relatively new service offered by many credit card companies that allow you to create one-time use credit card numbers for your real account. These numbers can only be used once, which reduces the risk of fraud if the number is stolen. This is different from the traditional method where you give out your real credit number and it can be used multiple times.
Using these numbers helps protect your real credit card number in case it falls into the wrong hands or is stolen. If someone stole your virtual number, they could only make a single purchase before it became invalid. That’s not much of a risk for most people because their real number would still be safe.
If you want more security, some companies also offer “single-merchant” virtual credit card numbers that are only usable with a specific merchant. For example, if you find yourself buying from Amazon often, you could get a virtual number just for Amazon which would make it more secure when shopping there.
When you’re shopping online, it’s always a good idea to keep your credit card information safe. Luckily, you don’t need to remember a new credit card number every time you shop online.
Virtual Credit Card Numbers are a great way to protect yourself from fraud when shopping online. A Virtual Credit Card Number is an alias for your real credit card number which you can assign to online merchants and use only once or as often as you like. Your real number isn’t revealed to an online merchant until the transaction is completed, so the merchant doesn’t have your information on file and can’t use your number again. Using this service protects you from unauthorized charges and minimizes the chance of fraudulent activity.
It takes just a few minutes to set up Virtual Credit Card Numbers, and it gives you one less thing to worry about when shopping online. You can even create different limits for each card according to how much you want to spend at any particular merchant – so if you want to set a limit of $50 for a particular merchant but $250 for another, you can do that!
It’s easy to get started using this service: just sign into Online Banking and click on the “Services”
So you’re shopping online, and you’re making a payment, and the website asks for your credit card number. You enter it in, hit submit, and then you wait. And wait. And wait some more.
This can be a dangerous time because attackers are watching, just waiting for someone to make a payment like this so they can steal your credit card details. It’s too easy to get distracted by the cat video your friend just sent you or the latest post on some blog, and before you know it, your credit card has been used for purchases all over the world!
But this nightmare scenario is easily prevented, thanks to Virtual Credit Card Numbers (VCCNs). These numbers are generated by your credit card provider so that each time you use them, they’ll only work once. If an attacker manages to get one of these numbers, they won’t be able to use it again because it won’t be valid.
While using your credit card online to purchase goods and services is certainly convenient, it does pose a security risk. If you’re like me, you’ve had your credit card number stolen from a huge corporation at least once in your life. And if you’re anything like me, that experience has made you deeply concerned about entering your credit card information on any Internet form anywhere.
The only solution is to create an entirely new credit card account with a temporary number before each time you intend to use it. While this may sound like a tediously manual process, it doesn’t have to be! If you have an account with the right bank, it can be as easy as logging into their website and clicking a few buttons.
What you need is a virtual credit card account. The idea behind such an account is that your bank will generate a temporary credit card number for one-time or limited use. You don’t need to ever see the physical plastic; just enter the one-time numbers into the transaction form and voila! Your bank will know how much money has been spent through that specific number and will bill accordingly. This means that if those numbers are later used fraudulently, your actual credit card information is still safe because those numbers weren’t valid after that one transaction
It’s a new year, which means it’s time to start thinking about your money. New year, new budget, right? But as you’re going through your monthly budget, you might notice that a large chunk of your income goes toward shopping.
If you love to shop online, and you have a credit card (or several), the virtual credit card number service offered by most major credit card issuers just might be the thing to help you keep your budget in check.
Basically, once you sign up for the service (and some issuers even offer this for free), you can get a credit card number that’s good for one use only. You use it just like a normal credit card number when making purchases online, and when the vendor charges that amount to the card, it’ll be declined. So if someone hacks into the merchant’s system and steals everyone’s credit card info, yours is useless to them because it won’t ever work again.
The service is extremely helpful in preventing fraud on your credit cards — both with online purchases and in-store purchases — but it can also help keep your shopping in check. If you’ve resolved to cut back on your spending this year, this could help you do it.
You’ve spent the last two hours looking for that perfect gift online.
The search was stressful, but you finally found it on a site you trust.
You’re ready to check out and go back to Netflix when you notice something:
The site wants your credit card information.
You don’t want to give it to them, but what choice do you have? You need that gift for your friend or family member.
Finally, you relent and give the site your credit card number. Your heart sinks as soon as the number is entered into the checkout page. You just gave your credit card number to a site you don’t know anything about. What if they steal it and use it for nefarious purposes?