Prior to the start of my internship here at Faire, I had no idea why some wallets came with an RFID protection feature. I thought slim leather wallets were merely a fashion accessory – a means to store your coins, cards and cash. In that sense, any form of small pouch or carrier would serve the same purpose, only less fashionable and practical. I wondered; what is the point of having such a feature? This prompted me to do some research online, and quickly found that such measures can be hugely critical to the safety of your credit card.

In my research, I came across a case study regarding a security consultant named Kristin Paget who demonstrated in front of a live audience how easy it was to obtain the personal information of a contactless credit card using a standard RFID reader, which she obtained on eBay for as little as $50.

In said demonstration, she read a volunteer’s credit card simply by brushing up against him, making as minimal contact as possible. It pointed to the fact that a fraudster could simply have the reader in his bag or pocket and invisibly scan information from his victim’s credit cards to obtain information like the credit card number, expiry date as well as the cvv number, simply by being in close proximity with his victim. She then encoded the data onto a blank card using a card-magnetizing tool and wired herself some money using the counterfeit that she just produced within seconds. You woudn’t even have the slightest clue. I found this particularly scary, especially when RFID readers and card-magnetizing tools are readily available for purchase by anyone online.

One way to prevent the risk of falling victim to such crimes is to get yourself a slim leather wallet with an RFID protection feature. This feature protects your credit card from such crimes, acting as a barrier for external RFID readers.

A personal favourite of mine from Faire has to be the Specter Travel Wallet. The wallet features dividers to separate cash currencies, card slots, sleeves to organize and protect SIM card ejector pins and SD/SIM cards, and a back slip pocket that fits the slim leather wallet; the Specter Card Wallet. Also, it goes perfectly with our luxury travel bags. Like all our other wallets, this wallet features RFID blocking technology to protect you from the above-mentioned crimes and identity theft.

I quickly realised that a wallet is not only a means to store your money, it is also a form of security for your personal credit cards. With RFID-blocking technology, you can have the added assurance that your credit cards are completely 100% safe.

Syafiq