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One of the reason for owning credit card is for oversea trips... Let's see the impact on traveller...

Credit and debit cards to be deactivated for overseas use

SINGAPORE — All card-issuing banks here will deactivate the magnetic stripes on credit and debit cards by Oct 1, under a directive by the Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS).

The move is in line with the association’s plan to phase out magnetic stripe technology — which is vulnerable to skimming — by next year to enhance card security. In January last year, a case of ATM card-skimming fraud led to S$1 million stolen from the accounts of 700 DBS and POSB customers. Under the ABS’ requirement, banks have the discretion to set their own criteria for implementation.

http://www.todayonline.com/business/cred...erseas-use

It's not that credit cards are disabled. It's just the magnetic strip interface.

Most if not all SG issued credits cards are chip enabled. So long as the merchant has a chip enabled terminal/reader there would not have any issues.

With this change, you may feel more at ease with your credit card being taken out of your sight when making payments. This is clearly to me a wake up call on the recent ATM skimming fraud cases. When incident occurs then there's the will or resolve to improve the security.

For not so developed/advance countries you may face issues if they only process mag stripe. For the truly backwards/disconnected countries there's still the manual fallback - carbon embossing that could still work.

The next to change old be smart card ATM cards. Then I hope no more 4/5 digit PIN but at least 6, if not alphanumeric keyboard base password.

The banks have made loads off consumers. It's high time they invest into technology to protect our hard earned got blood got sweat money!

More update on the issue... I am glad on the special arrangement for frequent travellers...

Banks pushing ahead with magnetic stripe deactivation

SINGAPORE--Banks in Singapore are implementing strategies to deactivate magnetic stripes on credit and debit cards as part of the industry’s efforts to protect consumers, merchants and banks against fraud.

The Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) announced the move earlier this week, adding that from October 1 onwards cardholders would need to activate the stripes on their cards for overseas use.

OCBC Banks Head of Core Cards & Unsecured Lending, Ms Wong Chung Yee, said customers can activate their stripes through a number of self-service channels.

At the same time, “customers who are frequent travellers in the last twelve months will be exempted from this measure. If they wish to have their magnetic stripes deactivated, they can do so via our self-service channels.”

http://www.todayonline.com/business/bank...activation