Your next bank card will have a fingerprint scanner built-in

That is not possible. You probably have to etch the die, nanometer for nanometer, to reverse-engineer the crypto on a physical level to get the fingerprint. Much like you have to do this with current cards. (See an article about this from the Chaos Computer Club)

Of course nothing has ever stopped anyone from copying your fingerprints directly with a camera or a scanner.

 

I used to have a strong opinion on all this 1984 Big Brother ****. But lately I'm in the lalalalalalalalala camp. Because paying attention was making me sickenly more & more disappointed in mankind.

 

Fingerprints? Retinal scans? Rectal probes by airport security? What next?

As for fingerprint ID credit cards, that's the absolute perfect security, right? Just remember...

 

Here in Australia, we just pay afterwards.

 

I buy everything with a credit card because I get 2-5% kick-back/month (depending on what I bought) from the credit card company. It's a tidy $um.

 

I'm guessing they will give you both options. But this would solve the problem of those annoying criminals that take a peek at PIN codes and then rob people from their card, this happens quite a lot in Holland. They don't even use any violence, but they use so called chatting tricks to distract you.

Exactly, that makes it more hacker proof.

I haven't used cash in years, I would love to have a cashless society. But when pay terminals don't work it's a problem of course, luckily this almost never happens.

 

So would the big banks (and that alone should raise red flags for consumers). There's a cost to going cashless. It costs merchants a few percentage points of the sale to accept credit and debit cards. They can't and won't just eat that. It does result in costing us more.

 

True. But there are also costs in accepting case. I used to handle cash deposits for a small business. It took time, and was also a little scary.

 

Yep. I agree with that too.

I know of a case where an individual works at a convenience store that has been robbed several times. The police don't even bother to responded that night unless someone gets hurt.

 

Your government (and the corporations running it) love people like you! Everything you buy and sell and where you do it and who you do it with are being tracked. At least I can have a pizza delivered, pay the neighbour kid for cutting the lawn, have a yard sale and even go to the nudie bar without big government holding my hand, watching and documenting. None of their business.

 

I like your attitude.

 

It is funny how people are more worried about their government than the bad guys - at least in democratic societies.

 

I really don't care that banks and government can see what I buy, it's not that exciting. Banks know everything about your financial situation I guess this also bothers you?

I don't know of any store (brick and mortar) that doesn't accept digital payments so apparently it's not an issue anymore.

 

True "brick and mortar" establishments do typically accept non-cash payments.

But just yesterday I went to my local farmer's market and a couple stands there didn't accept digital payments. Cash only.

My local police headquarters has 2 "under surveillance" parking spots in their parking lot for "safe" eBay and Facebook Marketplace purchases. Cash only (unless you are willing to accept a personal check from a stranger).

I don't see cash going away completely in what's left of my lifetime.

 

Interesting. For security, obviously. And with surveillance, I'm sure.

Me, I'd rather have an armed friend (who's a good shot) as a spotter

 

Ummm, that's what "under surveillance" means!

I hear you, but if the other guy comes with an armed friend too, it could get nasty. I personally don't want any bullet holes in my truck.

I note more and more local police stations are providing these "safe swap" places. It is certainly much safer than having them come to your house or even in a Walmart parking lot.

 

Yeah, I'd just make sure that my spotter is ~1 km off, with a good scope

And OK, I've been reading Matthew Stover's Caine novels Caine and Orbek make a good team! Orbek user a SPAR.

Yes, very true. I've noticed groups of people with phones, in front of a local gold shop. I suspect that they're trading Bitcoin or whatever. The shop has big windows, so people inside can see what's happening. And I'm sure that the owner, at least, is armed.

 

It depends on a country. People in some countries trust technology more, other less. It depends on rate of i.e. unreported employment and how other people perceive it.
Actually constitution of country I live in specifically mentions cash. Probably people writing it didn't imagined that electronic payments are going to be so widespread. I know this is going to be changed in the future, but for now it is legal safeguard of cash payments.

 

Well, US bills still say "THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE"

 

I hear you. But make no mistake - those businesses are not picking up the premiums Mastercard and Visa impose on each transaction. We The People... err... I mean We The Consumer are.

 

Firmly planted in this garden. They can go cashless/paperless/coinless whatever but they can never take away what was, what is been, and what still is, YET.

It's not the long historically accepted method of the type of currency that is at issue or driving this new innovation/interest of going cashless, and not even the convenience it could offer, but mega overpopulation that spawns so much more bad than good IMO.

 

Well, they can print new bills, and require old ones to be exchanged. I mean, they did that when the US went off the gold standard. I have some mementos

 

Never understood that debacle but one thing is certain, once the gold standard was replaced, it's been downhill ever since in my opinion. Shame too since it did seem to keep monetary exchange accountable to something real-tangible instead of how it's turned out. They can always use ink n paper printing presses to run off paper money indefinitely so that there's always plenty of greenback to dish around with nothing to secure the check n balances of how far to take it. Government ingenuity you know. Big spenders, send the debt to the world's nations in exchange for what have you.

 

As I understand it, the Nixon administration (aka Kissinger) did it because there was too much demand for dollars-to-gold. Especially from France, as I recall. But yes, it's allowed the US government (and consumers) to borrow hugely, and then inflate away the debt. It helps keep people buying useless junk. And makes a huge military more affordable. But it discourages saving.