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Comment by karthikb | Hacker News Reader

I’ve been asked to “call the number printed on the back of [my] card” which would be much harder to spoof.

Yeah, every time my credit card provider has needed to contact me, they send me an recorded message telling me to call the number on my card.

I've had different cards for 35 years at least, never got a call. What do they call about generally?

Suspicious activity. Suddenly using your card in the UK, when you're in the US. "Swipes" several hundred miles from your normal location, but also occurring in your normal location on the same day.

Ah, I never use my real card on the net, maybe that's why. I used to get a virtual card unique for every purchase but that has been discontinued now. Got a separate card for online usage that I only put money on when I want to buy something. Also needs to be opened up for Internet usage and many places require an electronic signature with the bank id app. Hoping this will be mandatory soon.

But numbers can change (lapses of mergers), is website would be best as card info can become stale over time —and enterprising outfits could scoop up that number.

> But numbers can change (lapses of mergers), is website would be best as card info can become stale over time —and enterprising outfits could scoop up that number.

How long are bank cards valid? I'd say they expire within 5 years? Also, if there is a merger, wouldn't they send you a new card with updated branding?

> But numbers can change

They could, but I just tried calling the numbers on the back of two cards from merged/acquired banks and they both forwarded to the acquiring bank. Yes it's a small sample size, but I suspect that there's enough money on the line and enough legacy contracts and systems that banks keep their communication channels active for some time.

Credit cards typically expire after some number of years, and mergers will typically include those phone numbers. If for some reason the acquiring company decides it wants to sunset its acquired phone numbers, it just needs to do so after the expiration date for the last card issued with that number still printed.

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