Disable all debit, credit cards without chip by December 31: Supreme Court

New Delhi : Supreme Court has ordered banks to replace all ordinary debit and credit cards with a chip inserted cards by December 31 to make card transactions more secure.

All debit and credit cards will become useless post December 31.

Cloning on existing debit and credit cards with magnetic stripe-only has become a major concern for the financial bodies. The new cards are EMV chip-based. EVM stands for Europay, Mastercard, Visa. The old magnetic stripe-only debit and credit cards are to be replaced by EMV chip-based ones by 31 December 2018.

The new EVM based cards are to be replaced free of cost. The bank will bear the cost for the new card. The new cards are being used since January 2016. The RBI had made it mandatory for banks to issue chip based cards to its new users opening a bank account post January 2016.

The RBI directive is applicable to not only all domestic but also the international debit and credit cards.

However, online payments still possess the risk of fraud if the information gets leaked to a person who is non reliable.