What is EMV?

EMV originally stood for “Europay International, Mastercard and Visa”, the three largest payment card organizations, which developed the EMV standard. It is now managed by EMVCo, a consortium of financial companies. It is an improvement on magnetic stripes, introducing a considerably higher standard of security. Data are stored on a processor ship and cannot be read unless the correct PIN is entered first. The risk of fraud is therefore significantly less than with a magnetic stripe. The EMV system has been widespread in Europe since the 1990s but was not implemented in North America until much later.

EMV – Wikipedia  :  Visa – EMV  :  Mastercard – EMV  :  EMV BASICS