A system for pre-authenticating a magnetic stripped card or smart card holder for a non-checking account transaction at the point-of-sale that includes a database that contains sensitive data, corresponding to digital photographic images of said account holders that employs a pre-authentication process whereby all account holders undergo a meticulous comparison with their submitted data against a plethora of objective public, private and internal databases culminating in a video displayed image at some point in the future enabling a merchant to make a visual comparison of the account holder either on site or during a mail order or telephone order transaction corresponding to the pre-authenticated image to prevent identity theft.