Re: Paranoia and the Outlawing of Cash

Jeremy Smith writes:
>        I too have noticed a growing trend in the use of electronic money
>for a wide range of transactions.  For example. I have an ATM card that
>was issued on my checking account.  With it, I can make purchases at any
>place displaying the Interlink symbol.  This includes gas stations, fast
>food places, and a lot of common stores such as the Good Guys, Circuit
>City, etc.
>        Personally, I find this way of doing business a lot more
>conveinent than carrying cash money.  No large demoninations to worry
>about, and if you are robbed, they have to crack your PIN to use the card.
>If they use a portabel reader, you could be screwed.  But, in most cases
>you would have time to call customer service and cancel the card.
>        I love progress.

In Denmark practically everybody has a 'DAN-card', a card with which all 
purchaces, no matter how small, can be charged directly to one's bank 
account. There is no charge for using or having the card, and it can be used 
practically everywhere. If for some reason you still want cash, there are 
plenty of ATMs around.

This means that the banks and the government know pretty much how much each 
of us spends on everything, but that's ok since we all trust the banks and 
the government  :-( .

When are we going to get real and untracable (!) electronic money ?

               Morten V. Christiansen
               Morten.V.Christiansen@Copenhagen.NCR.COM

>In Denmark practically everybody has a 'DAN-card', [...]

Universality.

>[...] all purchaces, no matter how small, can be charged [...]

Arbitrarily small transactions.

>There is no charge for using [...] the card

Subsidized.

The Dan-card system uses dial-up authentications for a large part (if
not all) of its transactions.  The telecom charges are causing the
system to run at a large loss; this wouldn't be a commercially viable
system.  The Danish government is looking at making 'DAN-coin', which
would be a smart card system that relies upon the physical security of
the device.  Since no on-line telecom charges incur, the coin system 
will be much easier to deploy.

Eric