"Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

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nisiprius
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"Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by nisiprius »

I have a Capital One credit card, and I see that in the account features I can activate a "Virtual Numbers" feature. It is free, and "Eno will appear when you're ready to check out online and get you a virtual number that links to your Capital One credit card." This seems like a no-brainer, but I was wondering if there might be privacy or security issues, that might not be obvious, that might be a reason not to do it. (For example, even though Capital One already knows everything and Eno is part of Capital One, it is still adding one more entity that has my financial information).
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Silk McCue
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by Silk McCue »

I think that it is the exact opposite of a security concern and is, as you say, a no-brainer in order to reduce the risk of fraud.

Cheers
atikovi
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by atikovi »

What is a virtual number? Does that mean I have to enter the new number as well as the expiration date, security code, zip code, every time I make a purchase instead of a one click transaction? No thanks. Too much hassle.
dukeblue219
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by dukeblue219 »

atikovi wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:22 am What is a virtual number? Does that mean I have to enter the new number as well as the expiration date, security code, zip code, every time I make a purchase instead of a one click transaction? No thanks. Too much hassle.
Virtual card numbers aren't nearly as popular as they once were now that Apple Pay and Google Pay are ubiquitous. Those (and similar) contactless services essentially do this behind the scenes so that there is nothing to be stolen and reused.

I try to pay with Google Pay everywhere I can, which is essentially any store but only some websites.

One of the downsides with virtual numbers is that they can leak through to your main account when you setup recurring payments. You may not be able to delete your virtual number and expect, for example, Sirius XM to stop charging to your account.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by nisiprius »

dukeblue219 wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:32 am...One of the downsides with virtual numbers is that they can leak through to your main account when you setup recurring payments. You may not be able to delete your virtual number and expect, for example, Sirius XM to stop charging to your account...
Please explain further. For me, that was going to be an important reason for using them.
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dukeblue219
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by dukeblue219 »

nisiprius wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 7:42 am
dukeblue219 wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:32 am...One of the downsides with virtual numbers is that they can leak through to your main account when you setup recurring payments. You may not be able to delete your virtual number and expect, for example, Sirius XM to stop charging to your account...
Please explain further. For me, that was going to be an important reason for using them.
Hopefully someone with experience using Eno will chime in, but in general a recurring charge will keep going through even after the original virtual number is expired. Same reason you can get a new CC in the mail and find that a few old subscriptions still renew even though you never gave them the new info. One random source of unknown quality:
https://www.mybanktracker.com/credit-ca ... -it-167574

Eno from Capital One may not work that way, I don't know.

Edit - - Reddit has a good discussion from people who have used Eno and you may be ok: https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinanc ... =post_body
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by mkc »

We have been longtime users of Citi's virtual cards and almost as long using CapOne's Eno.


We have had no problems with either, however I do prefer Citi's version for several reasons.

It lets you set an expiration date that you can update if needed, up to 12 months out). (CapOne sets their own, years out)

It lets you set a dollar limit that you can update if needed (CapOne's does not appear to)

It lets you close a card easily (have not tried this with CapOne)


Citi's version is not available (that I know of) as a browser plug-in. It's run standalone (although in some cases it can autofill the info into a open page for you).


There are a handful of merchants we have had problems using the virtual card with. For some reason, their systems won't take the card (it will come back as invalid or expired).
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by criticalmass »

Silk McCue wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:14 am I think that it is the exact opposite of a security concern and is, as you say, a no-brainer in order to reduce the risk of fraud.

Cheers
Sure, if you don't mind Capital One's browser plug in application "Eno" snooping on very website you visit and recording every click you make, while staying in touch with Capital One's data repository on you. What can go wrong? Not that Capital One would ever have any consumer data and privacy breaches of course, that could never ever happen. Oops.

The virtual number protects the card issuer. The Fair Credit Billing Act protects you.

If you must use this, consider disabling Eno access to your browser activity whenever you are not checking out from an e commerce website while using Capital One to pay.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by batpot »

criticalmass wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 11:47 am
Silk McCue wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:14 am I think that it is the exact opposite of a security concern and is, as you say, a no-brainer in order to reduce the risk of fraud.

Cheers
Sure, if you don't mind Capital One's browser plug in application "Eno" snooping on very website you visit and recording every click you make, while staying in touch with Capital One's data repository on you. What can go wrong? Not that Capital One would ever have any consumer data and privacy breaches of course, that could never ever happen. Oops.

The virtual number protects the card issuer. The Fair Credit Billing Act protects you.

If you must use this, consider disabling Eno access to your browser activity whenever you are not checking out from an e commerce website while using Capital One to pay.
indeed.
The only way this service benefits the consumer is avoiding the ~1 week period of not having that particular credit card while you await a replacement.

I've had 2 card numbers stolen in about 20 years and countless transactions. I'm not that concerned about it.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by 123 »

batpot wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 12:20 pm ...The only way this service benefits the consumer is avoiding the ~1 week period of not having that particular credit card while you await a replacement.

I've had 2 card numbers stolen in about 20 years and countless transactions. I'm not that concerned about it.
A considerable benefit of virtual credit card numbers is that if one use of a credit card number is hacked you don't have to change all your prearranged subscriptions (Netflix etc) or stores (Starbucks, Amazon) that used the same number. Having each vendor on a separate "virtual" account isolates problems.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by drk »

I use virtual account numbers from Citi regularly for online purchases or subscriptions. The latter especially because of hostile requirements that customers must call in to cancel.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by Ice-9 »

Over the years, I've collected a few means to accomplish the same goal of not having a company on the internet storing my card info. It's turned into a system that probably few other people would bother with, haha.

* Capital One Eno virtual numbers on my 1.5% cashback Quicksilver card
* Citi virtual numbers on my 2% cashback Double Cash card
* Paypal, usually connected to the 2% Citi card, but currently 5% Q3 cashback category on Discover

Obviously, in normal times when there isn't a better quarterly offer, I prefer to get the 2% cashback with Citi. However, Citi offers two ways to use their virtual numbers (1) a Windows-only app or (2) a Flash (?!?!) application within one's browser. I'm a Mac and Linux user, and the Flash application is a non-starter for me as a requirement to use an application to accomplish better security. :D

Therefore, my order of operations to accomplish this goal is this:

(1) Use PayPal whenever possible, maximize the cashback and still avoid card number stored on a server other than PayPal's

(2a) If PayPal isn't available at that online merchant, it's a one-time payment and I'm not in a hurry, go into my Windows virtual machine and run the Citi virtual account numbers application to pay there and get 2% cashback

(2b) If PayPal isn't available and it's a recurring payment or if I'm in a hurry, I log in to Capital One Eno in my browser to very quickly get same result but only 1.5% cashback
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by TallBoy29er »

I just used Eno about 20 minutes ago on backcountry.com.

Pros:
Uses a virtual number, auto populates the cc field when checking out (and if it doesn't, you can still quickly create a number and copy/paste into the payment fields), you can lock/unlock the virtual number anytime through your capitlaone.com account thereby preventing recurring or new charges (this is a major win in my book)

Cons:
the plugin monitors websites you visit as it has to recognize checkout pages. This is annoying, but the benefits outweigh the annoyance.
From the Terms and Conditions:

b. Always-On/Browsing Data: The App detects check-out processes, which means it must be "always on" when enabled. In order to help connect your online purchases to real-life merchants (e.g., sweethatvendor.com/sweethats is SWEET HAT STORE at brick-and-mortar address 123 Main St.), the App transmits to Capital One the URLs of the websites you visit (1) that appear to have checkout pages, and/or (2) that you are visiting when you fire up the App. This information is only used to help improve our learning engine, and will not be used to market other products or services to you.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by Starfish »

nisiprius wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:08 am I have a Capital One credit card, and I see that in the account features I can activate a "Virtual Numbers" feature. It is free, and "Eno will appear when you're ready to check out online and get you a virtual number that links to your Capital One credit card." This seems like a no-brainer, but I was wondering if there might be privacy or security issues, that might not be obvious, that might be a reason not to do it. (For example, even though Capital One already knows everything and Eno is part of Capital One, it is still adding one more entity that has my financial information).
A similar scheme is been around for many years in Europe.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by Ice-9 »

TallBoy29er wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 3:00 pm Cons:
the plugin monitors websites you visit as it has to recognize checkout pages. This is annoying, but the benefits outweigh the annoyance.
From the Terms and Conditions:

b. Always-On/Browsing Data: The App detects check-out processes, which means it must be "always on" when enabled. In order to help connect your online purchases to real-life merchants (e.g., sweethatvendor.com/sweethats is SWEET HAT STORE at brick-and-mortar address 123 Main St.), the App transmits to Capital One the URLs of the websites you visit (1) that appear to have checkout pages, and/or (2) that you are visiting when you fire up the App. This information is only used to help improve our learning engine, and will not be used to market other products or services to you.
FYI - You can log out of the Eno browser extension most of the time, and then only log back in if you're going to use Eno to shop. I do this so it doesn't pop up on every payment page if I'm say planning to use PayPal at a particular website instead.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by zincTwo »

I won't reiterate all of the excellent reasons listed above for using virtual cards.
I don't have a Capital One card, and my current bank stopped offering virtual numbers a year ago.
But for the non-Capital One users that want to use virtual numbers :

I now use Privacy.com for my virtual cards now. One feature with them is that Privacy will also "lock" the card to the first merchant that uses the number, so even if it was stolen (or eavesdroppers overheard it if I say it over the phone), it will only work for the first merchant to use it, and reject all others. I prefer PayPal, but I will use it for any "one time uses" or "small internet shops" (magazine subscription), or some recurring bills that require a credit card to be active on the account.

Even for "recurring" charges, if I manually cancel the number, it will reject any subsequent attempts. It will, however, continue to credit me if any refunds come back to the cancelled card.

The biggest downside, is that Privacy.com links to a debit card so I miss out on some "rewards" money (they make their money from the merchant transaction fees). They offer some non-free tiers of accounts that do offer rewards, but my usage level doesn't justify it.
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Re: "Virtual credit card number," Capital One: any reason why not?

Post by SpaethCo »

123 wrote: Fri Jul 10, 2020 2:25 pm A considerable benefit of virtual credit card numbers is that if one use of a credit card number is hacked you don't have to change all your prearranged subscriptions (Netflix etc) or stores (Starbucks, Amazon) that used the same number. Having each vendor on a separate "virtual" account isolates problems.
That's the way they sell the benefit, but the real problem with Eno as it has been implemented at Capital One is there is no identification of which card number was used for each charge. If you use Eno, go and take a look on your bill, or look at your transactions in the portal. There is absolutely no indication of which number was used for each transaction - they all tie to the main card number.

This post on Reddit mirrors my experience with this setup: https://www.reddit.com/r/CreditCards/co ... tless_but/

1) You experience fraud, you call Cap One to start the process
2) They cancel your physical card, and start the process to mail you a new one. They don't have a process that understands Virtual Numbers.
3) All your virtual numbers get mapped to the new card.
4) If one of the virtual numbers was compromised, new fraud charges just start showing up on the new card.

In order to get out of this situation I had to cancel all the virtual numbers, go through fraud shutdown and card reissue a 2nd time, and just gave up on trying to use Eno at all.

Instead of taking the time to setup virtual numbers, just maintain a list of all the places you set that card as a method of payment. Updating all the sites in the event of a compromise is far less of a hassle than dealing with this mess with Capital One.
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