RFID Blocking Wallets: Theft Prevention or Marketing Scam?

In the Digital Age, it is more important than ever for travellers to be aware of scams and other illegal methods to have their private information and banking details taken from them.

From using VPN’s to safely surf the web while using unprotected networks to general fraud awareness, there are surefire ways to keep yourself safe from digital theft; one method that, however, never stops causing confusion and controversy among both experts and the public is RFID protection.

Despite this technology being around for years and being heavily marketed by pretty much every wallet and travel gear manufacturer around the world, there is a lot of misinformation about how RFID devices actually work and how they can be exploited.

For this reason, today we’ll delve a little bit deeper into what RFID really means, and whether you should concern yourself with RFID protection during your travels.

Disclosure: This article contains affiliate links, and as Amazon associates we may get a small commission from qualifying purchases. We believe in only advertising products we trust in and use ourselves!

What does RFID mean

RFID stands for “Radio Frequency Identification”, and is simply a system that uses radio waves emitted from a reader to identify information stored on a microchip tag.

You can imagine it much like a barcode, except it doesn’t need a visual to scan and it has much greater range; this makes it an essential tool that can provide data in real-time for a huge variety of businesses and industries.

What does RFID mean for you

RFID’s are extremely widespread, and for us common folks one of the main applications for an RFID chip would be anytime we use the NFC or contactless option for a payment; the RFID chip in our credit or debit card interacts and exchanges information with the terminal to complete the transaction.

The same happens every time we scan a ticket when using public transport. Another item you might not have known to contain an RFID chip is your passport, where it stores all your personal biometric and contact information.

Essentially, every time you’ve ever tapped a card against a device to validate it or make a payment you’ve used a form of RFID to wirelessly transfer information!

What is RFID theft

The problem with this system is that, while extremely practical for fast payments and easy information transfer, it can in theory be used by thieves to gather personal data from any RFID device on your person by using a scanner, a technique called skimming. The information they collected can then be potentially used for online purchases, credit card cloning, fraud and even identity theft.

Now, it’s important to know that the chances of this happening are extremely small, since the scanner would have to be very close to you due to the card’s weak signal, and most information that the thief collects will be encrypted and useless anyway.

Most contactless payments are also capped at a fairly low amount, limiting how much money can be stolen by a single skimming, and since the scan can only pick up one signal at a time it is likely to fail if there is more than one RFID-capable card in your wallet.

All in all, you’re statistically more likely to simply lose your credit card or get your wallet stolen rather than having your RFID chip scanned by a criminal. With that said, RFID theft does occasionally happen; it is a rare occurrence, but one that we went through ourselves.

In our case, we fortunately got away with simply getting our money refunded and having to replace our credit card, but it was a scary experience that could have been much more difficult to handle had it happened during our travels instead of in our hometown.

How to protect yourself from RFID theft

While keeping in mind that the chances of you being a victim of RFID skimming are extremely low, there are several different ways to protect yourself and your data from theft.

Here are a few that we like to implement during our travels:

Use an RFID blocking wallet, card or sleeve:

RFID blocking wallets and sleeve use a layer of metal, usually steel or aluminium, to block or distort the signal emitted from the scanner so that it cannot read the chip and collect any information.

Many wallets aimed at travellers have this feature already included, so you definitely won’t struggle to find the right model to suit your needs; with that said, RFID blocking wallets are generally quite a bit more expensive than their standard counterparts!

Alternatively, you could add an RFID blocking card to your wallet; this will jam any attempt to skim your information, and the card itself is extremely light and discreet. Since it will of course occupy a slot, however, it might not be the best option if you have a small wallet or carry a lot of cards!

An RFID blocking sleeve, on the other hand, is made to cover individual cards. It’s by far the cheapest option that doesn’t involve wrapping your cards and the inside of your wallet in aluminium foil, and has the only inconvenience of having to be removed every time you want to use your card.

Disable your RFID chip:

Depending on your card provider, you may able to completely disable tap-to-pay contactless payments, in turn removing the chance of RFID theft entirely. Alternatively, you could also ask your bank to provide you a card without an RFID chip.

Keep your cards in unusual places:

Since an RFID reader is only effective when at least a few inches to the chip, an effective way to avoid getting scanned is simply not to keep your wallet in spots where someone normally would, such as your back and front pocket. Or alternatively, simply keep your card out of your wallet and in a separate pocket. This way, the thief won’t know where to pass the reader, or will simply pass it where he believes your wallet should be and get nothing in return.

Should you really worry about RFID theft

Despite the controversy and claims to the contrary, RFID theft is a rare but real occurrence.

Whether by investing in a new RFID blocking wallet or sleeve, or simply by adopting some useful habits, there is nothing wrong with doing all you can to make sure your data is as safe as possible. Then again, should you really worry about being targeted by RFID thieves while at home or abroad?

Probably not.

As we already said, the chances of that happening to you are very, very slim. And if by chance you do spot unusual transactions, quickly getting in touch with your bank will usually get you your money refunded, even though it can be a stressful matter to take care of.

So all in all, an RFID blocking wallet is likely to be more of an investment for future peace of mind rather than for actual theft prevention.

So there you have it, these are our thoughts on RFID theft and wallets.

What about you, do you use RFID blocking wallets at home and while travelling? Have you ever been a victim of RFID theft before?

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