Stop typing your real card number into shopping sites. Get a virtual card number from your card issuer’s app, your phone’s wallet, or a service like Privacy.com, and give stores that instead. A store that never has your real number can’t lose it in a breach.
Where the number comes from decides what it can do. Some virtual numbers lock to one store, some close after a single purchase, and others only stand in for your real number at checkout.
Check your card’s app first, since some issuers build virtual numbers into theirs. Capital One lets eligible cardholders create them in its mobile app or on its website. One general number works at most online stores, and merchant-specific numbers each work at a single store. You can lock or delete any of them, and your physical card keeps working.
Your phone and browser come next. Apple Pay doesn’t send your actual card number to the apps and websites you pay through. For eligible cards, Google Pay can fill in a randomly generated number through Chrome’s autofill. Turn it on when Chrome offers it at checkout, or in Chrome’s payment settings.
When your issuer has none, Privacy.com‘s free Personal plan makes up to 12 new cards a month. Each one can be single-use or locked to the first store that charges it, with a spending limit you set. The cards draw from a checking account or debit card, so purchases come out of your bank account rather than a credit line.
Match the number to the purchase. A one-time order from a site you’ve never used gets a single-use card. A store or subscription you’ll keep paying gets a number locked to that store.
Use the physical card for any booking you’ll claim at a counter. Capital One notes that a hotel front desk, a rental car counter, or a will-call window can ask to see your physical card, and its number won’t match the virtual one you paid with. A return goes back to the number you paid with, so keep the receipt and note the virtual number’s last four digits.
Start with the store that already has your real card number saved, and swap in a number locked to that store today.
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