Before my wall of text, i first understand the difficulties of network effects, getting credit cards accepted world wide, much less state wide, but i think with the advent of square, stripe, paypal, etc. the barriers to launch are much lower than they were even 5 years ago. I'm sick of banks trying to squeeze every last drop out of the customers, and i'd gladly pay for a banking service rather than be the product it's selling.

Credit cards are surviving in the stone age, firms would rather make it easy for you to get yourself in debt that to provide a service that prevents fraud and abuse. So, VC people out there. If you want to make a billion dollars, you should start a bank. People who work for the credit card community, there are simple upgrades that would make life a lot safer.

Simple upgrades to make security safer:

Chip and pin is low hanging fruit in the US. The fact that most americas have no idea what those threes words mean is an international embarrassment.

READ ONLY passwords for bank account information, in addition to different read write options, that have an extra level of security. I'd gladly use services like Mint, except i'd rather not give write power to anyone except me and a browser i only user for banking only at home.

Tie credit cards to cell phones. Get a text after EVERY purchase (this would honestly not amount to more than 10 or so texts per day). Have this as opt-out, not opt-in. Yes, i would use this, yes it would effectively stunt any fraud. You would not have to respond to the text at all, however, if you suspect fraud, you can immediately cancel the card.

Voice recognition for phone calls. When you take out a card, you are require to read a paragraph or two, and upload, or mail in a recording of your voice. This could immediately alleviate much of the phone security nonsense that i deal with when i'm on the phone. It's not a cure all for passwords, but it's certainly an additional level of security.

IP zones for online credit card purchases. I know about five 100 mile radii that i will be making an online purchase from. Add an extra level of security for any time i'm outside of that.

As far as credit agencies are concerned, there is a serious issue with quasi-oligopoly situations there. Extremely difficult to disrupt, but developing secure credit vehicles could create incentives for the current oligopoly in credit cards to improve security for their own cards.

At the end of the day, i'm more than willing to admit that people themselves are a big part of the problem. Example: a year ago, watching a man freak out on an apple store employee when he would not give a computer to him, that apparently belonged to his son, who gave it to the apple store a week earlier. The son apparently signed off that only he could receive the computer, and only in person. The enraged father was rambling on about how insane it was that they would not surrender the computer to him, and how he would never use apple products again. I wish there were profitable business models for people who actually like following the rules and read the contracts they sign.

tl;dr: I don't want a credit card that makes it easy for me to spend money. I have cash for that. Give me a credit card that makes me feel safe entering the number into any website, and i'll gladly pay a premium for it.