Not content with destroying the world’s economies, the banking industry is also bent on ruining us individually, it seems. Take a look at Verified By Visa. Allegedly this protects cardholders – by training them to expect a process in which there’s absolutely no way to know whether you are being phished or not. Even more astonishing is that this is seen as a benefit!

Frame inline displays the VbV authentication page in

the merchant’s main window with the merchant’s

header. Therefore, VbV is seen as a natural part of the

purchase process. It is recommended that the top

frame include the merchant’s standard branding in a

short and concise manner and keep the cardholder

within the same look and feel of the checkout process.

Or, in other words

Please ensure that there is absolutely no way for your customer to know whether we are showing the form or you are. In fact, please train your customer to give their “Verified by Visa” password to anyone who asks for it.

Craziness. But it gets better – obviously not everyone is pre-enrolled in this stupid scheme, so they also allow for enrolment using the same inline flow. Now the phishers have the opportunity to also get information that will allow them to identify themselves to the bank as you. Yes, Visa have provided a very nicely tailored and packaged identity theft scheme. But, best of all, rather like Chip and PIN, they push all blame for their failures on to the customer

Verified by Visa helps protect you from fraudulent claims from cardholders – that they didn’t take part in, or authorise, a payment. Once you are up and running with Verified by Visa, you are no longer liable for chargebacks of this nature.

In other words, if the phisher uses your Verified by Visa password, then it’s going to be your fault – obviously the only way they could know it is if you told them! If you claim it was not you, then you are guilty of fraud; it says so, right there.