FICO Blog author Doug Clare stated in a recent article that the mag-stripe was expected just to go away, however the mag-stripe has proven to have nine lives, outliving nearly everyone’s forecasts of its demise. Perhaps with the EMV (Europay, MasterCard and VISA) finally entering rhe U.S. market, perhaps our faithful friend the mag-stripe is now rally entering the twilight years.
Visa announced last August that it would be introducing the EMV standard for payment transaction messaging in the U.S., which will be rolled-out in a series of steps over the next few years. MasterCard, as expected, recently announced that it will also be supporting and enabling the EMV transition.
