Discover To Monitor Credit Card Transactions At Gun Stores
Discover credit card is set to begin tracking cardholder purchases at gun retailers starting in April, according to an exclusive report from Reuters.
“Discover Financial Services (DFS.N), a provider of credit cards, told Reuters it will allow its network to track purchases at gun retailers come April, making it the first among its peers to publicly give a date for moving ahead with the initiative, which is aimed at helping authorities probe gun-related crimes.”
Reuters
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) announced last September that they would be creating a merchant category code that specifically tracks transactions from gun retailers. This code enables financial institutions like Discover to provide federal agencies more data about gun transactions in the hope that they can combat gun violence. The credit card company has stated that its intention is to monitor any activity deemed “suspicious” to authorities.
However, there are some limitations to creating a separate code for gun transactions. The code will only be able to track transactions from a gun retailer, and will not be able to itemize specific products. This means that a consumer could buy hunting gear, for example, and their transaction would be included in this data.
“Discover has no plans to track cardholder purchases of firearms or provide that information to anyone, nor could we. Merchant Category Codes are used to categorize types of stores, and do not enable us to see the product that was purchased. We are not alone in using these codes; they are used consistently by all the major payment networks. We strongly believe in the right of our customers to use their Discover cards for any legal purchase and remain committed to maintaining the privacy of their information.”
Discover statement to Fox News
There are obvious concerns that conservatives and second amendment advocates have with this financial practice. The main concern is that this can lead to a massive violation of privacy rights. The act of tracking purchases at gun retailers, even for law-abiding citizens, is essentially monitoring someone before the crime is actually committed. A financial company can report a large transaction to federal authorities when in reality it was a law-abiding citizen who legally purchased products.
The tracking of gun transactions may inevitably lead to a gun registry as well. It is no secret that many liberal politicians would favor a national registry that lists every citizen who owns a firearm and how many they own. Financial companies tracking transactions is just the first step.
