Electronic Pickpocketing

What Does Electronic Pickpocketing Mean?

Electronic pickpocketing refers to the process of stealing credit card information from people in a public place using RFID wireless technologies. It is a form of identity theft.

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Techopedia Explains Electronic Pickpocketing

In recent years, it has become easier for hackers to use existing wireless hotspots and move through a crowd to steal credit card data using RFID wireless technologies. Credit cards are made with an embedded RFID strip that can be read by some wireless devices. This has led to things like contactless payment systems, but it has also exposed cardholders to financial fraud. To combat this new type of identity theft, credit card companies have developed RFID wallets that use a solid layer of material to shield the credit cards and prevent wireless technology signals from reaching inside someone else’s wallet.

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Margaret Rouse

Margaret Rouse is an award-winning technical writer and teacher known for her ability to explain complex technical subjects to a non-technical, business audience. Over the past twenty years her explanations have appeared on TechTarget websites and she's been cited as an authority in articles by the New York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine and Discovery Magazine.Margaret's idea of a fun day is helping IT and business professionals learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages. If you have a suggestion for a new definition or how to improve a technical explanation, please email Margaret or contact her…