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PCI-DSS Compliance: Why Is It Important!

photo auteur emmanuel pasquet

EMMANUEL PASQUET

Approx. reading : about 5 min

PCI-DSS Compliance: protect your business and your customers against fraud!

Credit card fraud is one of the biggest problems in e-commerce today. To combat this problem, the industry has supported a set of standards designed to protect consumer data from fraudsters.

The PCI-DSS payment card industry data security standard applies to all organizations that process credit cards from major card networks and provides guidance on how to securely handle credit card information. cardholders to reduce fraud and data theft.

Compliance with PCI-DSS standards is not just a matter of internal practice. PCI-DSS compliance is certified by the PCI Security Standards Council. PCI-DSS compliance certification is an important way to communicate to customers and partners that data security is taken seriously and that all necessary steps have been taken to protect sensitive bank data.

Online fraud is constantly evolving and adapting to measures and practices designed to thwart it, so there will never be a set of standards that provide perfect and foolproof protection against data breaches and payment card fraud.

That said, PCI-DSS compliance ensures that a merchant or payment service agent follows the industry’s best, most up-to-date recommendations to protect their data and keep their customers safe.

Who maintains standards and certifies PCI-DSS compliance?

PCI-DSS is overseen by the PCI Security Standards Council, which was jointly established in 2006 by Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover, and JCB International. Their mission: to provide mandatory standards that would increase the security of cardholder data in order to protect them from fraud.

Originally, each card network maintained its own set of standards. Recognizing the growing threat of fraud and the difficulty in complying with multiple overlapping sets of standards, they began to work together to form a single global set of effective standards, which became PCI-DSS.

Additional information and guidance is issued regularly to clarify aspects of PCI-DSS as needed, and the board certifies organizations and may audit merchants to validate compliance with their management practices and solutions.

Merchants who fail to comply with PCI-DSS may be subject to fines and other penalties imposed by the affected card networks.

What are the PCI-DSS requirements?

PCI-DSS organizes its requirements into six categories called control objectives, each containing specific requirements. These control objectives are as follows:

1- Build and maintain a secure network and systems

  • Install and manage a firewall configuration to protect cardholder data. The firewall should analyze all inbound network traffic and prevent untrusted networks from accessing your systems.
  • Change vendor-supplied defaults for system passwords and other security settings. Default passwords are the first a scammer will try - you should use strong, unique passwords to protect your systems.

2- Protect cardholder data

  • Protect stored cardholder data with encryption, hashing, masking, truncation, and other recommended methods.
  • Encrypt transmissions of cardholder data over open public networks. Strong encryption is preferable.

3- Set up a vulnerability management program

  • Protect systems against malware and perform regular antivirus software updates.
  • Develop and maintain secure systems and applications. Vulnerable software should be patched immediately when security vulnerabilities are discovered.

4- Implement strict access control measures

  • Restrict access to cardholder data to authorized personnel only and on a strict “need-to-know” basis.
  • Identify and authenticate users who access system components. Each user should be assigned a unique identifier in order to be accountable when accessing cardholder data.
  • Restrict physical access to systems that store cardholder data.

5- Regularly monitor and test the networks

  • Track and monitor all access to cardholder data and network resources. Logging mechanisms must be in place for user activities that may affect cardholder data.
  • Regularly test security systems and processes to identify new vulnerabilities that could be exploited.

6- Maintain an information security policy

  • Maintain a strong information security policy for all staff. Educate employees and contractors on the importance of protecting sensitive cardholder data.

Merchant service providers (vendors that provide web hosting, e-commerce software, anti-fraud tools, and management of recurring billing with payments) must also maintain PCI-DSS compliance, otherwise merchants that use their departments may be responsible for data breaches regardless of their compliance status.

For merchant service providers, level one compliance requires an on-site audit by a qualified security assessor approved by the PCI board.

About DOTSHA

Dotsha delivers the first subscription-to-cash automation platform designed to put every subscription-based or usage-based business on autopilot … from early subscription to cash collection!  

Your business can scale fast without turning its back-office into a mess! 

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All-In-One platform that unify {Pricing}+{Check-in}+{Billing}+{Payments}+{Dunning}+{Reporting} while the MRR just keeps growing, Dotsha’s plaform is an easy to use and quickly implemented cloud-based platform that augment your existing information system with robust API integrations in order to deliver optimal automation with minimal code. You will forget we are there!

photo auteur emmanuel pasquet

EMMANUEL PASQUET

Approx. reading : about 5 min

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