By Gillian Petrarca ’23
Staff Writer
“The College has removed the credit card terminals out of an abundance of caution while possible security issues are resolved by the provider,” Alex Wirth-Cauchon, CIO and executive director of Library, Information and Technology Services wrote in an email to the College Community.
On Oct. 28, Wirth-Cauchon sent an all-campus email stating that credit card terminals have been temporarily removed from the Dining Commons and the Frances Perk Cafe. This has inconvenienced many students without a meal plan, such as Frances Perkins Scholars and commuter students.
Wirth-Cauchon stated in an email to the Mount Holyoke News that LITS monitors various information security communities within higher education and beyond. They found security concerns on similar devices that were behaving in unexpected ways when verifying credit card information.
Kylie Gellatly FP ’23 said that the credit card terminals being unavailable has changed her dining experience in Blanchard.
As a commuter student without a dining plan, she normally buys five swipes from Blanchard at a time using her debit card. While the credit card terminals are out of service, Wirth-Cauchon stated that students can pay for food and beverages using their OneCard. In the all-campus email, he provided a link for students to upload funds to their OneCard using credit or debit cards. Wirth-Cauchon also pointed out that there are two automatic deposit machines, one in Blanchard on the ground floor and one in the lobby of the Central Services Complex, where students can upload money to their OneCard using cash.
“As a commuter student, I don’t normally use my OneCard for money. [It’s] just for building access,” Gellatly said. “We can upload money to it, but that’s kind of the trouble I am in now, it is not very clear how to do that. The whole thing is very inaccessible and tailored to residential students.”
For Zo Brown ’22, a commuter student, the card terminals being out of use brings up a larger problem that they have with dining facilities.
“[Dining as a commuter student] is really isolating, to be frank … I wish they would give us the option of having a certain number of social swipes to sit down with friends while they eat meals,” Brown said.
Wirth-Cauchon concluded that LITS is currently working with the vendor of the terminals and the LITS security team to assess options for either reinstalling the devices or replacing them.
“We are working as quickly as possible but will take the time necessary to ensure the security of the College network and of community members’ credit card information. Ideally, we hope to have the readers back in operation within a week, but some of that timing is out of our control,” Wirth-Cauchon said.