I Want My Cold Hard Cash

$20 Stacks
Originally uploaded by Phalanx.

Information theft is THE crimeof the digital age... it's never going to be preventable, just like brick-n-motar crime isn't really preventable. So today when I read about MasterCard International having 40million carholders information jacked, it makes me wish it was a lot easier to get and keep cash.

For the past decade now it has become increasingly difficult to obtain, keep and use cash. Not that we the people don't have money, but that the digital age continues to ask us to rely on electronic means to pay for our goods and services. The digital age wants us to forget about using paper -- of any sort -- for consumer transactions. Consider those Visa CheckCard commercials, which basically tell the consumer don't use the greenback, shit, don't even use a check -- just use that little piece of plastic with the vulnerable magnetic strip on the back.

I figure it's only going to get worse, because ALL consumer information is being transfered to databases -- medical records, bills, banking info, DNA scans, shopping habits, whatever the fuck can be collected, analyzed and collated is going to be converted to one's and zero's whether we like it or not.

Pretty soon consumers, the young of today, will start seeing paper money with some sort of "cheap" stigma to it, opting for plastic, eschewing the lovely, tangible feel of that special U.S. Mint paper in one's fingertips.

Speaking of fingertips, the digital age is pushing to have consumer information embedded in a microchip that will be implanted in one's thumb or forefinger -- something that bums, panhandlers, thieves and street hustlers will no doubt (and easily) cut the fuck off to rob people in the near-future digital age.

The thing about Cash though is that criminals love it the most because it is virtually untraceable. For instance in Europe there is a ���500 note, that is the denomination of choice for the criminal element because it represents so much value in a think piece of paper. The ���500 note is banned in Portugal and soon to be in other Eastern Europe for the obvious reasons.

The biggest problem is that you don't know what information of yours is stolen, but not being used until a later date -- late around Christmas of 2007!

I'm looking to keep all my money in accounts that aren't tied to my debit/credit cards -- that way identity theft susceptiblity is reduced.

Diversification, baby, is what we're all about.