As the world moves toward a cashless economy, electronic transaction tools such as payment cards, e-wallets and even cryptocurrencies become more streamlined and regulated. Although the latter two means of exchange are gaining popularity, payment cards never lose their relevance in the modern world.
In fact, the progressively demanding Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) is one of the implications of an increasingly advanced payment card technology and system. The goal of PCI DSS is not simply to fight against payment card fraud. It is to maintain trust in an evolving digitized economy.
Why is compliance to the PCI DSS crucial for your business?
Most of the massive and fluid transactions, with widespread interconnectivity in the international trade environment, rely on the world’s biggest card issuers. The payment cards (such as Visa, Mastercard, and American Express) issued by these international brands become recognized throughout the world. Participating in this global network can make a significant difference to your business’s success.
Of course, to protect their brand, these issuers set the standard for the payment card data system, which coincidentally also becomes the benchmark or rough guideline for other issuers to follow. If an ecommerce company complies with PCI DSS, it gains not only the respect of international card issuers, but also local issuers.
PCI DSS compliance is a continuous process of optimization
Complying with the PCI DSS is challenging, but with the help of an external Qualified Security Assessor, the process can be streamlined. While there are distinctive 12 requirements of the PCI DSS to fulfill, the organization suggested a series of six steps to optimize your system based on priority risk levels.
The steps are summarized below. You can also download the official document.
- Set up the system in such a way that does not permanently store sensitive data. Once the data has served its purpose, do not store them any further.
- Be prepared to respond to system breach. If data is compromised, you need to be able to contact the card issuer to mitigate risk of financial loss imposed to the user.
- Create secure payment card applications on the front-end (client-side). This includes following certain design aspects based on the official requirements of PCI DSS.
- Monitor control access to the system and do not trust everyone within your organization to have access to sensitive data.
- When data is stored in the system, it must be protected using encryption or other means.
- Set up policies and procedures in order to enforce and prevent internal data breach.
Work with a Qualified Security Assessor
Xynexis is a PCI Qualified Security Assessor company with years of experience in the protection of valuable data, systems and network. Our consultants will help you identify your system’s weaknesses, and suggest remediation solutions as well as provide additional resources if you have limited resources or skills to do the work in house.
To learn more about how we can help you achieve PCI DSS Compliance, visit our services page.
