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The aluminium Cardprotector protects cards against bending, breaking and unwanted RFID and NFC communication.

This is a practice, also known as digital pickpocketing, where your cards are read, activated, or copied from a distance. Criminals can commit this identity theft with the use of RFID readers, without ever touching your wallet. The frequencies of the RFID / NFC tag can’t penetrate aluminium, making the Cardprotector like a firewall against this unauthorised reading and copying of data.

Radio-Frequency IDentification (RFID) and Near Field Communication (NFC) are wireless communication methods. A chip and an antenna provide the ability to be activated and read remotely. It’s convenient – there is no need to take your card out of your wallet to pay or check in. It makes payment easier and faster, but does involve a risk, because criminals could activate unprotected cards remotely and steal your money or personal data unnoticed. The Cardprotector is the heart of our wallets and protects against these risks because the radio waves cannot penetrate the aluminium case. This has been tested by TNO/TÜV, an independent European organisation that validates the safety of products.

RFID has been in use for decades and is a forerunner of NFC. Unlike an NFC card, an RFID card does not usually have a memory, so it functions as a wireless barcode that only transmits its own serial number. NFC is a smarter technology and can store small amounts of data. One example is a public transport card, which stores when and where it has been used so that the conductor can access this data without any internet connection.

Both RFID and NFC have two types: active and passive. The major difference between these two is the energy supply. Active types of RFID and NFC are supplied with power and can communicate wirelessly on their own. The passive type does not have a power supply and communicates only when activated by an external reader. This is why modern cards are not equipped with a battery. From the outside, it’s often not possible to recognise which type of communication is in use. The distinction can be made, however, by looking at the application. Some examples can be found below:

Many travel cards, business access cards and the latest credit and debit cards have an RFID or NFC tag. These cards can be recognised by one of the following logos:

RFID readers can be used to scan a card from a metre away. When RFID / NFC cards are completely inside the Cardprotector, this wireless communication is blocked and the cards are fully protected. In use, when the cards are slid out a few centimetres, the wireless signal is weak, but sufficient for communication over a short distance. This way your privacy remains secured in the best possible way.

Secrid wallets provide the same amount of protection as traditional wallets. Currently there are no standards for measurement of magnetic field protection, so the degree of protection cannot be expressed as a number or percentage. The best protection from magnets remains distance.

Magnets can damage magnetic stripe cards. The magnet’s strength and time of exposure influence how much damage can be caused. Long exposure to the weak magnetic closure on a bag is more likely to damage the card than brief exposure to a strong magnet.

The type of magnetic stripe card also influences the amount of damage a magnet can do. There are HiCo (High Coercivity) and LoCo (Low Coercivity) cards that are characterised by the properties of the magnetic stripe. LoCo cards can be written with a lower magnetic field, and as a result, strong magnetic fields can change and/or erase its data. It’s a similar process to overwriting cassette tapes back in the day. Examples of modern applications of LoCo cards are parking, hotel or gift cards. HiCo cards, for instance older payment cards, are more resistant to external forces but remain sensitive to magnets.

In practice, the magnetic stripe on cards is hardly being used anymore. We’ve gone from swiping to inserting the card and contactless payment. Over the years, cards have been improved by the addition of a chip and an antenna, making their usage smarter and more effortless. As new global standards aren’t made in a day, most modern payment cards contain both a magnetic stripe and a chip. As regular magnets only affect the magnetic stripe, modern cards can’t be damaged significantly by the proximity of a magnetic field.

Although all sleeves are made of a very durable material, other objects in your pocket might still scratch the surface. Light scratches are part of normal usage and will blend in over time while your wallet builds a beautiful patina.

If your sleeve is made from leather, you can get rid of light scratches or slight signs of abrasion by carefully rubbing with your finger over the affected spot.

If the cards fall out, it might be due to worn-out felt pads at the top of the Cardprotector. This issue can be fixed within minutes at a Care & Repair Point. Find a nearby Care & Repair Point in the Store locator or contact our Customer Care for an alternative solution.

You can temporarily fix worn-out felt by gently rubbing the felt pads with a key to roughen them up again.

Storing more cards than intended or cards that are broader than a standard credit card may make them get stuck in the Cardprotector. To solve this possible complication, we designed a new lever mechanism for the Cardprotector – the Salamander – in 2016. If you have the Salamander mechanism, use the following four steps to release your stuck cards: 

1. Pull the lever until you hear a strong click. This step requires a decent amount of force. Do not fear to break the lever.

2. The lever should feel loose now. Make sure to pull the lever entirely and remove the cards that stick out.

3. Press the lever firmly back into the Cardprotector until you hear a strong click.

4. Pull the lever as usual and remove all cards. Now the Cardprotector should function properly again.

Check which lever your wallet has. The old lever can be identified because it doesn’t feature a line at the lever mechanism. You can upgrade it with the new Salamander lever at one of our Care & Repair points.

Please fill out this repair form or contact our Customer Care for a solution. We’re here to help.

The Salamander lever is named for its ability to split the arm that pushes the cards out. Just like a real salamander, the arm ’grows back’ once it has been pushed back into place. You can recognise the Salamander lever on the base of the Cardprotector – it has two small plastic arms to the right of the lever. You can recognise it because there is no seam in the middle of it. If the lever you’re holding does have a seam, your wallet isn't equipped with the new mechanism, and we advise you not to use extra force.

If your wallet has a production error, you can return it for a free replacement within the warranty period. All products made and sold by Secrid have a standard warranty period of two years. When you register your product, you will receive an extra year of warranty for a total of three years. Our Premium wallets have a standard four-year warranty, extended to five years after product registration. 



Alternatively, you can find a nearby Care & Repair Point and have your wallet repaired there, or contact our Customer Care to request a product return. The return form includes a prepaid return label so you can ship the package free of charge.

All products made and sold by Secrid have a standard warranty period of two years. When you register your product, you will receive an extra year of warranty for a total of three years. Our Premium wallets have a standard four-year warranty, extended to five years after product registration. If you have further questions regarding warranty, please contact our Customer Care.

Our designs have inspired many companies since we launched the Secrid Cardprotector in 2009. Despite our patents, copycats keep emerging. While we do our best to stop them, it remains a time-consuming and difficult task. We realise it’s not always easy to make sure you’re in possession of an original Secrid product. To validate the authenticity of your purchase, you can register your product online using the unique serial number inside the Cardprotector. Besides a certificate of authenticity, you’ll also receive a third year of warranty after registration.

We also maintain a careful retailer policy and encourage people to purchase our products in physical stores. Besides giving the opportunity to experience our products, our aim is to support the independent retailers. That is why we don’t offer our products on platforms such as Amazon, eBay and Bol.com. As we can’t guarantee that products on such platforms are original Secrid products, we strongly advise against ordering from one of these online suppliers. To ensure you purchase an original Secrid product, please visit our store locator to find a Secrid retailer near you.

If you have any further questions, tips or feedback regarding Secrid copycats, please contact us at brandprotection@secrid.com.

It is our ambition to keep distances within our supply chain as short as possible. In our local production policy, we have stated that we prefer suppliers who are closest to our assembly locations, as long as they can provide the quality and craftsmanship required to make products that can last as long as possible. As a result, most parts are produced in the Netherlands and others in Italy. Together with our 50 suppliers, we can ensure high-quality products, good working conditions and care for the environment. Our products are assembled daily with precision and enthusiasm in social enterprises in Delft, Leiden and Haarlem. You can read more about our production process here.

We recognise that being in business means creating both positive and negative impact on people, animals, and our planet. Although sustainability has been a part of the Secrid DNA since making the first Cardprotector locally in 2009, we don’t call ourselves a sustainable company. For us sustainability is part of our holistic design approach, where each choice is carefully considered. Deciding to produce locally and other measures may have increased the price of our products, but also resulted in creating products in a way we can be proud of. We think design with longevity in mind is at the cornerstone of making products that have the power to be more valuable over time while reducing the impact on the environment. That is why we focus on creating high-quality consciously produced pocked-sized essentials that can stand the test of time. For more information, check out our sustainability page.

We use Life Cycle Assessment software from Ecochain to calculate the environmental footprint of our products, processes, and facilities (Heartquarters and Brandstore). With this approach we can track all our greenhouse gas emissions for scopes 1,2 and 3 of the GHG Protocol, which we use as an input for carbon offsetting projects.

Cutting emissions is crucial for combating global warming, but completely eliminating them isn't feasible yet. So, we perform an annual Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) to calculate our carbon emissions from raw materials to product delivery. It’s good to know we still have to include end-of-life emissions. Besides reducing our emissions, we team up with FairClimateFund to cover the remaining part of our emissions by compensating it.

We started working with FairClimateFund in 2018, but we’ve been offsetting the production of every single product since we launched the first Cardprotector in 2009. The projects we invest in are certified to the Gold Standard and Fairtrade Climate Standard. Currently, we double our investment in these projects, buying twice the required CO2 credits. This includes for example a clean cooking project in India and a reforestation project in Peru.

If you need advice and/or support for reporting a possible wrongdoing within our organisation you can visit our whistleblowing policy page. We take responsible business very seriously and make sure everyone involved in the production of our products is treated ethically and with respect.

There are plenty of options for doing business with us. To allow us to provide you with a considered response, please send an e-mail to sales@secrid.com stating your proposal clearly and concisely.

Secrid is currently being sold in over 8.500 carefully selected shops worldwide, typically in fashion boutiques, leather goods stores and gift shops. If you would like to become a Secrid retailer, please send an e-mail with your store name, address, website, three other brands you carry and some photos of your store to sales@secrid.com.

Making people happy with our products is what we love to do. We hope you do too. So, we’re offering the opportunity to order a larger quantity of personalised Secrid wallets as corporate gifts. With a minimum purchase volume of 25 items, you can engrave the aluminium Cardprotector in our wallets with text or a logo in the spot of your choosing. Please visit our Corporate Gifts page to start the process. Once everything has been set up, you can start gifting within three weeks.