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We've had a few customers come in who wanting to use their phone to pay want to go on our WiFi.
When I say no , they put their stuff down and walk out.
Surely contactless isn't dependant on WiFi and who would want to use a strangers WiFi to log on to their bank account?.
We are far from remote and have 5g.
Scam or not?
Sounds scammier than a scammy thing to me.
AIUI...
Contactless works by storing a virtual card on your device secured by your mobile security/ passkey. The validation of the card goes through the card network of your card provider/merchant as the shop not the phone banking app.
Happy to be (preferably politely) re-educated if I'm wrong though..
Payment with a phone does not need a data connection, the card details are stored on the phone and it uses NFC to send the details to your Payment terminal. The data connection to the bank is through the terminal.
Not sure what the scam could be though?
I’ve heard of this before. They just want the WiFi PW as they can access from outside the shop for free Internetz. Presumably your shop is close to a public space where they can simply sit and use your WiFi whenever they like.
It could be a scam in so far as once on your non-public Wi-Fi they're inside your perimeter, potentially with access to other private resources. But, anyone with the smarts to do that would find it trivial to deauth a client and steal the handshake, getting on Wi-Fi is the relatively easy part in that sort of hack.
Simply wanting free Wi-Fi is plausible, but then they could just ask rather than invent some cock & bull story around it (and who needs free Wi-Fi these days anyway when large, cheap data plans are commonplace?). Maybe they wanted untraceable Wi-Fi to download grumble or worse?
Scam IDK. But you don’t need any internet connection from your phone to pay by NFC virtual card from e.g. Apple Wallet.
Maybe you could set up a fake network and MiTM them to steal their data if they’re foolish enough to not use SSL or VPN?
There might be guides to this kind of thing. This popped up from a quick DDG search https://hackproofhacks.com/man-in-the-middle-attack-tutorial-simulation/
The shop I work in is in an old stone building with 2 foot thick walls - there’s barely a phone signal inside. Customers sometimes ask for access to our wifi so they can move money around via their online bank to pay for something.
I’ve seen that too @dovebiker. My mate let a lad connect to his hotspot so he could get money from his mum to pay for groceries in a small shop.
@cougar - lots of people, particularly young people, can’t get/can’t afford a mobile contract so use cheap PAYG and often run out of data.
Set up a guest WiFi SSID and change the PW regularly?
Depending on your setup your router may have an option for “enabling guest WiFi “ which will make it secure/separate and easy enough to do - just a few clicks… In that scenario you could make it open with no PW required for ease of access. Ideally you might be able to setup timed availability so only available during opening hours along with restricted bandwidth to stop streaming and use OpenDNS servers etc.
The details held on your phone aren't virtual cards, they are device tokens - they aren't card details at all. A virtual card is one created without a physical piece of plastic, so a real PAN security code etc that could be used online or punched into a card machine. The device token is linked to a card (could be linked to a real or virtual card) then when the token is presented to Visa or whoever they look up the card number and route it to the bank.
Sorry for the pedantry but from a security point of view it is an important distinction. Lose your phone and you haven't lost your card details, the device token can be cancelled without compromising the actual card (virtual or physical).
lots of people, particularly young people, can’t get/can’t afford a mobile contract so use cheap PAYG and often run out of data.
Hm. That may have been true once of a time but today? A contract is the most expensive way to run a phone, the only reason I can see to have one offhand is because you're paying for the phone itself on the drip. Smarty is currently £8/month for 50GB of data (random example because it's who I'm with, there's probably cheaper) and that's a rolling 1-month contract with no commitment.
First Wi-Fi wanter was a 20 something American ,second was a young mum.
It just seemed strange . It’s not as if the mum tried to pay ,found there was no funds and had to move money. She just wanted our Wi-Fi.
Seems kinda sus -I use my debit card in google wallet all the time, and I never connect to wi-fi unless at home or at a friends house.
As someone else said, the phone doesnt need internet for that - it's only communicating with the shops card reader via NFC.
Smarty is currently £8/month for 50GB of data
It may surprise you but plenty of people can’t afford £8 per month for data when they are, for example, single parents with 3 kids all with phones, all of a sudden that’s £32 per month
Add on home broadband too...
However I've also met kids and parents who did not understand that to use WiFi at home or public reduced mobile data bills, or you can choose lower quality streaming...and I've met teenagers who rip though 200gb of data a month. It gets a spenny business quickly.
Smarty is currently £8/month for 50GB of data (random example because it's who I'm with, there's probably cheaper)
Huh. Impressions in terms of speed and availability?
Can't fault it. Yell if you want a referral.