Fraud is on the rise. With deep pockets and creative minds, fraudsters and cybercriminals are becoming increasingly organized, sophisticated, and focused on the low hanging fruit that exists within the retail space.

The security playbook has widened, and now includes EMV, PCI DSS, and point-to-point encryption (P2PE), with new regulations such as PSD2’S SCA tightening up vulnerabilities. In addition, robust anti-fraud solutions are now part of most card acceptance POS and payment gateways.

As the data protection battle continues, there are some strong security patterns emerging:

• CNP payment fraud will continue to rise and fraudsters will get increasingly sophisticated

Squeezed out of the traditional payment chain, criminals are increasingly targeting remote Customer Not Present (CNP) transactions where shoppers’ data is especially vulnerable.
According to Juniper Research, online payment fraud will top $22 billion this year—and could reach $48 billion by 2023. Fraudulent attacks are becoming more sophisticated using tactics such as phishing, ID theft, pagejacking, wire scams, and merchant ID fraud. In 2020, watch out for ‘imposter bots’ that exploit the growth of AI-driven chatbots for online customer support to draw out payment details and other sensitive information from established retail websites.

• Tokenization will become more widespread as merchants seek to secure the payment chain while delivering more personalized and connected services (including IoT)

Tokenization replaces sensitive payment data with a randomly generated token that lets their transaction be tracked and their ‘footprint’ remembered making it ideal for CRM, loyalty and personalized promotions. The merchant does not touch, or store payment data and fraudsters can’t reverse the token to access account details. By 2020 it’s expected that there will be 20 billion IoT devices, a proportion of these will no doubt facilitate transactions too, creating a whole new window of opportunity for fraudsters. Tokens can be used across all channels and can even facilitate transactions between devices in IoT environments.

• New forms of authentication will emerge fueled by PSD2’s SCA requirement which comes into effect in 2019 (EU) and 2020 (UK)

Strong Customer Authentication (SCA) will soon become essential for retailers in order to ensure compliance with PSD2. Each transaction will require two different types of authentication taken from three criteria (something you own, something you know and something unique to you). With a physical card and a PIN, EMV already meets the criteria. However, for CNP and online transactions, it’s not so easy, with extra passwords and registrations increasing friction and possibly dropped sales at the checkout. To prevent this, merchants may turn to ‘customer-familiar’ smartphones and biometrics to ease the process. They will be supported by the likes of MasterCard, who are already championing biometric authentication.

• Anti-fraud solutions will deliver better security decisions with less friction for legitimate buyers

Advanced, risk-based decision-making for e-commerce will help to reduce CNP fraud using updated standards from EMV 3D-Secure. Examining 10 times more risk factors than before to help decide whether step-up authentication is required. In addition, companies that facilitate digital payments will likely layer 3D-Secure with other advanced analytics technologies like artificial intelligence, to help analyze for fraud. Across retail, self-learning neural models will be used to automatically spot patterns much more swiftly. They will also enable closer rules setting and customization – essential for peak periods such as Black Friday – to minimize false declines and reduce the incidence of chargebacks.

• Merchants will have to tighten up their processes – whether mandated or not

It’s not possible for technology alone to fully eliminate retail fraud, especially for online stores. Like all hi-tech environments, people, and processes are often the source of inadvertent breaches. Retailers will have to continually update network security systems including firewalls and antivirus software, train staff and maintain audits to keep their defences high and information safe. Expect to see more security specialists employed full-time, even within smaller merchant organizations.

• Security will become a core differentiator for selecting a payment service provider

Businesses will be more proactive in their cybersecurity strategies when it comes to protecting the consumer. As senior execs and boards are increasingly held accountable, security is moving beyond a simple compliance tick-box towards a real corporate imperative supported by organisational wide procedural frameworks. Reflecting on this, security will become a critical differentiator ahead of reliability and costs for merchants seeking payment partners and providers.

While there are a plethora of security add-ons and antifraud software available, merchants shouldn’t forget the basics. This includes maintaining awareness of the latest fraud regulation and ensuring systems (and those of providers) are verified and compliant with all the latest standards; specifying PCI point-to-point encryption (P2PE) and tokenization for all payment platforms.

With GDPR necessitating clear policies for storing and handling ‘all’ customer data and the reporting of data breaches, retailers must make sure the right processes and training are in place to support these too.

If in doubt, payment partners such as FreedomPay, are often first to spot new security trends and can provide practical support and guidance to help keep businesses and their customers safe.

With so many touchpoints in the customer sales journey, it’s getting harder to lock-down retail payment chains against fraudsters (losses on UK-issued cards totalled £671.4 million in 2018). For many physical retailers, PCI compliance alone is no longer enough to ensure data security, protect customers and safeguard their business and reputation. That’s where point-to-point encryption (P2PE) comes in.

Why is P2PE important?

P2PE provides merchants with one of the most significant ways to minimize the risk of criminals stealing their cardholders’ data during in-store, face-to-face, card-present transactions.

What does it do?

P2PE protects credit card data from the point of sale (POS) as it travels through a merchant’s local network and across the internet before it reaches the payment processing system at the acquirer’s end.

How does it work?

It does this by encrypting data immediately upon entry from a payment terminal connected to the POS device to the third party secure environment where it is decrypted before authorization – from the starting point to the end point – hence its name. This encryption method utilizes complex encryption keys controlled by a P2PE solution provider, ensuring the merchant, or any third party, has no means of accessing the data traversing the network.

Why does this help?

Encrypting card data in this manner, means that even if a fraudster manages to capture it, they are unable to access the user’s ID or card data, without the relevant encryption/decryption keys. So, sensitive payment data can be safely sent through the entire payment chain without risk of compromise.

What about PCI Compliance?

P2PE is like a booster for PCI DSS – it goes further, is more exacting and safer than PCI DSS alone. And it makes achieving PCI compliance much simpler and less expensive too! That’s because it effectively takes the POS system and payment platform out of PCI scope, reducing time, effort and cost of compliance (but only if you use a PCI approved P2PE solution and provider, and follow the correct operational procedures).

Will it stop retail fraud?

No, it doesn’t prevent fraud using lost or stolen cards, but it does prevent criminals from accessing card data at the point of sale or while the cardholder data is in-transmission from the POS device to the payment processor.

Does it stop merchants using transaction data?

Not if you use it in tandem with a tokenization solution such as FreedomPay CardStorTM . This replaces the cardholder’s primary account number (PAN) with a ‘token’. Retailers can use tokens to identify the customer – for loyalty programs or automated form filling – and to supply transaction-based information to CRM systems and for business intelligence.

Is it hard or expensive to implement?

It can normally be integrated easily as part of your payment solution or platform using a PCI P2PE toolkit to provide the relevant encryption keys/pathways. If in doubt speak to your authorized payment provider. Any additional costs can often be quickly offset against time, effort and cost savings from PCI scope and audit reduction.

Still need to be convinced?

Here’s a quick summary of the benefits:

1. Simplifies PCI DSS compliance, reduces scope and cost
2. Extra data security without compromising customer experience
3. Minimizes risk of fraud, data breaches and subsequent fines, loss of custom and reputation
4. Data protection that keeps payment services simple
5. Used with tokenization, won’t affect loyalty programs or other commerce platforms
6. Software-based, easy to integrate – especially with FreedomPay.

Read more about payment security here.

October of 2015 marked a big month for FreedomPay customers – it represented the deadline for merchants to transition more than one billion payment cards to the EMV standard, and upwards of 12 million credit card terminals at merchant locations.  FreedomPay’s advanced commerce platform made the transition easy, and merchants are lauding the service expertise FreedomPay provided along the way.

 “Ensuring the security of consumer payment data is a top priority for merchants across all industries,” said Chris Kronenthal, Chief Technology Officer of FreedomPay. “Working with leading organizations in lodging, gaming, retail, foodservice, healthcare and higher education to implement PCI best practices including EMV, tokenization and Validated P2PE, FreedomPay is helping merchants secure their payment environment, prevent EMV liability exposure and reduce scope for PCI compliance.”

While FreedomPay’s innovative technology is the key to making transactions easier and more secure for customers, providing service that goes the extra mile is what sets us apart. This emphasis on service is why we offer on-site support for our stored-value program rollouts.  Clients of all sizes benefit from hands-on training and support for product launches.  For instance, we spend one day a week at the headquarters of one of our largest foodservice clients to ensure that we are meeting their needs as a partner.

We supply day-to-day account management to merchants to ensure their satisfaction. Our ten-person management team delivers expertise and experience in the payment industry, assisting our partners to solve for multifaceted challenges on demand.

Here at FreedomPay, we take pride in the fact that all members of the product support department are passionate about solving problems and finding technical solutions that truly address the needs of our customers.

We understand that our merchants aim to provide quality customer service, which is why we provide the same in return – especially during industry shifts like the transition to EMV.

When you partner with FreedomPay, you can rest assured that our team will provide exceptional, ongoing support to ensure that the products and services you use are deployed to your full satisfaction and are 100% operational.

Need help with anything? Our support team is available to current customers, partners, and future prospects. Visit FreedomPay online to learn more about our phenomenal customer service!

The House Financial Services Committee held a full committee hearing on data and cyber security, where the Members of Congress challenged payment industry experts on protecting consumer data in the era of computer hacking.

Brian Dodge of the Industry Leaders Association, Laura Moy of the New America Foundation, Stephen Orfei of the PCI Security Standards Council, Jason Oxman of the Electronic Transactions Association and Tim Pawlenty of the Financial Services Roundtable were called to speak before the Committee.

The panel covered a range of issues, from foreign cyber security threats, to malware at the point-of-sale, to card fraud and online fraud, to the costs of fraud on financial institutions, merchants and consumers.  Several Members debated ongoing legislation and the role that Federal and State regulators and law enforcement agencies should play in consumer breach protection.

In their opening statements, Mr. Oxman and also Mr. Orfei advocated for a layered approach to data security, with EMV at the point of sale, point-to-point encryption, and tokenization.

Mr. Orfei continued, “EMV chip is not a silver bullet.  Additional controls are needed to protect the integrity of payments online and in other channels.  This includes encryption, tamper resistant devices, malware protection, network monitoring and more.  All are vital parts of the PCI standards.”

As a solution provider, FreedomPay has committed to delivering the highest standards in the industry that help merchants protect their customers’ credit card data.  FreedomPay offers merchants the technologies and supporting programs be on the leading edge of payment data security, adhering to the rigorous PCI Validated P2PE standard, and extending functionality across the broad ecosystem of Card Present and Card Not Present payments.

EMV, PCI Validated P2PE and tokenization are what we do.  And really, that is only the beginning.  Just wait until you see what secure transaction data can do.