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AmEx Blue card reader
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Dec 1999
Location: Plainview, NY
Status:
Offline
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i have possessed an american express blue card for a few years, and noted the smart chip on it. lo and behold, amex was (is?) giving out the card readers for free. not being one to pass up free hardware, even hardware ostensibly not compatible with the mac, i had one sent to me gratis.
now that it's here, and hooked up to my quicksilver via a serial-usb adaptor i had lying around and a $5 usb cable, it doesn't work. it sits and flashes, no matter if pcscd is running or not, and the CocoaCard application included with the muscle distribution doesn't recognize the card or the reader.
so what should i do with this reader? it's a gemplus gcr415, which apparently was a special model just for american express (manufactured in 1999, incidentally, at the height of the dot com boom when anything, even giving away smart card readers for free, seemed like a keen idea).
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: planning a comeback !
Status:
Online
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What does that chip do anyways ?
I think it's just a marketing thing, without real value or function.
No other Amex card has a chip.
-t
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Professional Poster
Join Date: Jan 2003
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Offline
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I think it's supposed to create a disposable credit card number for online transactions. Even if the online store's website gets compromised by hackers, all the crooks get is a useless one time number.
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Moderator  Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: Atlanta, GA
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Offline
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This is a good summary of what the smart chip technology was supposed to do, but its adoption has lagged for whatever reason.
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Mar 1999
Location: Bellevue, WA
Status:
Offline
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I have that card since 2000. AE also sent me the card reader, but it's in serial. Anyway, I never used that 'smart chip' feature. On the other hand, disposable credit card number was a feature for Discover Card members, but it never went big.
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Dec 1999
Location: Plainview, NY
Status:
Offline
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Originally posted by Kenneth:
I have that card since 2000. AE also sent me the card reader, but it's in serial. Anyway, I never used that 'smart chip' feature. On the other hand, disposable credit card number was a feature for Discover Card members, but it never went big.
american express also used to offer this feature, through their "private payments" service. they stopped that service sometime between two years ago (last time i used it) and this year tho. it didn't require use of the card reader, and just required one to log on to the amex site as usual.
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Junior Member
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Madison, WI USA
Status:
Offline
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Toss it, it's just junk now.
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15" Aluminum Powerbook G4, 1.25GHz, 1GB, 80GB. Airport Extreme. 4G iPod 60GB.
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Professional Poster
Join Date: Oct 1999
Location: :ИOITAↃO⅃
Status:
Offline
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The Blue card was just a marketing exercise anyway. They wanted to carve out a space in the no-annual-fee market.
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