IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/jfsres/v50y2016i1d10.1007_s10693-015-0218-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Identity Theft and Consumer Payment Choice: Does Security Really Matter?

Author

Listed:
  • Charles M. Kahn

    () (University of Illinois)

  • José M. Liñares-Zegarra

    () (University of Essex)

Abstract

Abstract Security is a critical aspect of electronic payment systems. In recent years, the phenomenon of identity theft has gained widespread media coverage and has grown to be a major concern for payment providers and consumers alike. How identity theft has affected consumer’s payment choice is still an open research question. We use the 2009 Survey of Consumer Payment Choice (SCPC) to study the effect of identity theft incidents on adoption and usage patterns for nine different payment instruments in the U.S. Our results suggest that certain types of identity theft incidents affect positively the probability of adopting money orders, credit cards, stored value cards, bank account number payments and online banking bill payments. As for payment usage, we find that particular types of identity theft incidents have a positive and statistically significant effect on the use of cash, money orders and credit cards and a negative and statistically significant effect on the use of checks and online banking bill payments. These results are robust across different types of transaction, after controlling for various socio-demographic characteristics and perceptions toward payment methods.

Suggested Citation

  • Charles M. Kahn & José M. Liñares-Zegarra, 2016. "Identity Theft and Consumer Payment Choice: Does Security Really Matter?," Journal of Financial Services Research, Springer;Western Finance Association, vol. 50(1), pages 121-159, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jfsres:v:50:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1007_s10693-015-0218-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s10693-015-0218-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10693-015-0218-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Klee, Elizabeth, 2008. "How people pay: Evidence from grocery store data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(3), pages 526-541, April.
    2. He, Ping & Huang, Lixin & Wright, Randall, 2008. "Money, banking, and monetary policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(6), pages 1013-1024, September.
    3. Hayashi Fumiko & Klee Elizabeth, 2003. "Technology Adoption and Consumer Payments: Evidence from Survey Data," Review of Network Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 2(2), pages 1-16, June.
    4. Orazio P. Attanasio & Luigi Guiso & Tullio Jappelli, 2002. "The Demand for Money, Financial Innovation, and the Welfare Cost of Inflation: An Analysis with Household Data," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 110(2), pages 317-351, April.
    5. Carlos Arango & Varya Taylor, 2009. "The Role of Convenience and Risk in Consumers' Means of Payment," Discussion Papers 09-8, Bank of Canada.
    6. Eisenstein, Eric M., 2008. "Identity theft: An exploratory study with implications for marketers," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 61(11), pages 1160-1172, November.
    7. Fernando Alvarez & Francesco Lippi, 2009. "Financial Innovation and the Transactions Demand for Cash," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(2), pages 363-402, March.
    8. Schuh, Scott & Stavins, Joanna, 2010. "Why are (some) consumers (finally) writing fewer checks? The role of payment characteristics," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1745-1758, August.
    9. Duncan B. Douglass, 2009. "An examination of the fraud liability shift in consumer card-based payment systems," Economic Perspectives, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, issue Q I, pages 43-49.
    10. Humphrey, David B & Pulley, Lawrence B & Vesala, Jukka M, 1996. "Cash, Paper, and Electronic Payments: A Cross-Country Analysis," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 28(4), pages 914-939, November.
    11. David B. Humphrey & Lawrence B. Pulley & Jukka M. Vesala, 1996. "Cash, paper, and electronic payments: a cross-country analysis," Proceedings, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), pages 914-941.
    12. Ron Borzekowski & K. Kiser Elizabeth & Ahmed Shaista, 2008. "Consumers' Use of Debit Cards: Patterns, Preferences, and Price Response," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 40(1), pages 149-172, February.
    13. Julia S. Cheney, 2010. "Heartland Payment Systems: lessons learned from a data breach," Payment Cards Center Discussion Paper 10-01, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    14. Kahn, Charles M. & Roberds, William, 2008. "Credit and identity theft," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(2), pages 251-264, March.
    15. Ching, Andrew T. & Hayashi, Fumiko, 2010. "Payment card rewards programs and consumer payment choice," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1773-1787, August.
    16. Copes, Heith & Kerley, Kent R. & Huff, Rodney & Kane, John, 2010. "Differentiating identity theft: An exploratory study of victims using a national victimization survey," Journal of Criminal Justice, Elsevier, vol. 38(5), pages 1045-1052, September.
    17. Kahn, Charles M. & Roberds, William, 2009. "Why pay? An introduction to payments economics," Journal of Financial Intermediation, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 1-23, January.
    18. Keith B. Anderson & Erik Durbin & Michael A. Salinger, 2008. "Identity Theft," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(2), pages 171-192, Spring.
    19. Nicole Jonker, 2007. "Payment Instruments as Perceived by Consumers – Results from a Household Survey," De Economist, Springer, vol. 155(3), pages 271-303, September.
    20. Lisa E. Bolton & Joel B. Cohen & Paul N. Bloom, 2006. "Does Marketing Products as Remedies Create "Get Out of Jail Free Cards"?," Journal of Consumer Research, Oxford University Press, vol. 33(1), pages 71-81, June.
    21. Charles M. Kahn & James McAndrews & William Roberds, 2005. "Money Is Privacy," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 46(2), pages 377-399, May.
    22. Julia S. Cheney, 2006. "Supply- and demand-side developments influencing growth in the debit market," Payment Cards Center Discussion Paper 06-11, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    23. Pagan, Adrian, 1984. "Econometric Issues in the Analysis of Regressions with Generated Regressors," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 25(1), pages 221-247, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mikhed, Vyacheslav & Vogan, Michael, 2017. "How Data Breaches Affect Consumer Credit," Working Papers 17-6, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, revised 16 Nov 2017.
    2. repec:eee:jbfina:v:88:y:2018:i:c:p:192-207 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Cheney, Julia S. & Hunt, Robert M. & Mikhed, Vyacheslav & Ritter, Dubravka & Vogan, Michael, 2014. "Identity theft as a teachable moment," Working Papers 14-28, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:jfsres:v:50:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1007_s10693-015-0218-x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Sonal Shukla) or (Rebekah McClure). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.