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0 pointsvalzam4y ago0 comments

This partly exists. But could of course be much simpler to use:

1) some banks/fintech offer virtual cards. For example, whenever I need to pay with credit card at a site that seems to be using some homegrown system I create a new virtual card in transferwise and destroy it right after.

2) I've seen banks offer virtual cards with CVC codes that change every 24h hours.

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TeMPOraL4y ago· 2 in thread

Re 1), virtual cards are useful if you can get them (banks that I use stubbornly refuse to provide them; same story with subaccounts). But it feels like doubling-down on the bad mental model.

Cards make sense in meatspace, not on-line. Virtual cards are stretching the analogy already. Short-lived virtual cards are pushing it to the limits. What users need is the ability to generate single-use payment authorization tokens. Talking about "cards" carries too much irrelevant meatspace baggage; we've already worked out different, better-fitting abstractions for digital use.

valzamOP4y ago

FYI Google Pay actually creates a new "credit card", i.e. a single-use token for every payment, something along those lines would probably be great if more widely adopted.

https://support.google.com/pay/merchants/answer/6345242?hl=e...

I agree with the other post that keeping meatspace terminology isn't bad. Offering a "Single use credit card" would be an easily understandable feature.

LordDragonfang4y ago

You talk about "users" as if the majority of people are tech-literate. They are not. Imagine explaining to your parents what a "single use digital token" is. Now imagine explaining "it's a card that you only use for this".

Outdated/meat-space abstractions are useful for both driving adoption and getting laypeople to understand intuitively what you mean. And beyond that, most of us encounter dozens of them a day without blinking. Think about that the next time you check your electronic mail on your general-purpose computing device you call a "phone".

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