Learn more about Magnetic Encoding

Definition of Magnetic Tracks

Track 1: Developed by the International Air Transportation Association (IATA), track 1 contains alphanumeric format of 79 alphanumeric characters, at 7 bits per character with information for applications such as automation of airline ticketing or other transactions where a reservation database is accessed.

Track 2: Developed by the American Bankers Association (ABA), track 2 contains numeric information encoding of 107 numeric characters at 5 bits per character for the automation of financial transactions. This track of information is also used by most systems that require an identification number and a minimum of other control information.

Track 3: Developed by the Thrift Industry, track 3 contains information, some of which is intended to be updated (re-recorded) with each transaction (e.g., cash dispensers that operate “off-line”).magnetic stripe is encoded with bit patterns, which correspond to alphanumeric (Track 1) or numeric (Tracks 2 & 3) ASCII characters. The number of bits on a given track is limited to a certain number of bits per inch, or BPI. There are also a series of all zero bits encoded at the beginning and end of a magnetic stripe; these “clocking bits”establish timing for the reader, or the time the reader will detect flux reversals as it moves down the magnetic stripe.

For each character in the bottom right section of the Track 1 Coded Character Set table, there is a bit pattern which consists of six bits. To determine this bit pattern for each character, read to the left of the character in its corresponding row, from bit 1 to bit 4. To determine bits 5 and 6, read above the character in its corresponding row. For example, the bit pattern for “D”(Column 2, Row 4) would be “0 0 1 0 0 1”plus odd parity bit = 1.

For the Tracks 2 & 3 Coded Character Set table (page 7), read to the left of each numerical character. For example, the bit pattern for “6”(row 6) would be 0 1 1 0 with odd parity (P).