re: Credit Card Chip system. Or not?

It's called EMV (Europay/MasterCard/Visa, I think) and much of the civilized world has been doing it for years. It's the reason why the US has a disproportionate ratio of fraud to transaction.

In years past, fraudulent transactions would be covered mostly by the card issuer. With EMV, there is a liability shift from the issuer to the vendor. If vendors do not make the switch to EMV-based transactions, any fraud costs are to be footed by the retailer or vendor.