Should you save your credit card for future purchases?

[RussellMania]

I personally think it's safer to save credit card data for sites that you shop often. My sister on the other hand says that its safer to not save credit card data and type in your credit card information every time you want to buy something.

From my perspective, it's safer to type in your credit card information once because the more times you type in your credit card information, the more chances a hacker has to steal it. If you type your credit card data 100 times a year, it gives hackers 100 chances to steal your credit card details.

My sisters perspective is, if Amazon ever gets hacked, hackers will get access and steal your credit card information. If you don't store your credit card information for future purchases, then hackers can't steal your credit card information.

Me and my sister were arguing back and forth about this, who is right? I tried searching online to prove that it's better to type in your password 1 time, then multiple times, but came up empty handed. I guess its not something that people think about often.

[Curson]

Hi RussellMania,

The answer to who is right is : it depends.

Most important commercial sites follow PCI DSS regulations. Even in the case of a database break, credit cards information would not be put at risk. In this case, your sister perspective is right.
However, PCI DSS implementation is not mandatory, so some sites may store credit cards information in an insecure manner, which may allow hackers to recover them. In this case, your perspective is right (assuming your computer is malware-free).

The most secure way to handle Internet payment transactions, is to use a Digital card. These are virtual cards that can issued by your bank and linked to your credit card. Usually, a digital card is a one-use payment card, which means that even if it's credentials is stolen by a malware, it cannot be used anymore.

Regards.