American Express this year plans to begin issuing chip-based cards in the U.S. as part of a "roadmap to advance EMV chip-based contact, contactless and mobile payment for all merchants, processors and issuers" of its cards, according to the company.
As part of the migration to the chip-and-pin security standard —- considered more secure than the magnetic stripe and signature security used in the U.S. —- Amex said processors must be able to support such transactions by April 2013.
As of October 2013, Amex said merchants would be "eligible to receive relief from PCI Data Security Standard reporting requirements" if their card acceptance devices were equipped to accept such transactions.
As a further incentive for merchants to upgrade equipment, Amex outlined a plan to transfer liability for fraud starting in October 2015. MasterCard, Visa and Discover previously released their own roadmaps with similar timeframes.
Source: Business Travel News