While the full effect of the recent passage of the Dodd-Frank Act is yet to be determined, it’s clear that substantial changes are in the offing. Look for changes in interchange rates, possible new fraud fees and new Fed regulations

Payments industry expert Ross Federgreen comments on the July 1 deadline for PA-DSS, when all payment applications need to be compliant. All payment processors need to ensure that their merchants are using compliant software.

Cyber criminals continue to target retail and hospitality industries, intercepting cardholder data in transit. PCI DSS compliance should mitigate vulnerabilities that contribute to data breaches.

Aberdeen report shows firms using PCI-DSS can halve costs

Total direct cost to a merchant from a PCI event

Beginning January 1, 2008, Visa will implement a series of mandates to eliminate the use of
non-secure payment applications from the Visa payment system. These mandates require
acquirers to ensure their merchants and agents do not use payment applications known to
retain prohibited data elements and require the use of payment applications that adhere to
Visa’s Payment Application Best Practices (PABP).

Listed below are Visa key dates including data security mandates and reporting deadlines.

Merchants are becoming acutely aware of the mandated requirements of the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). Unfortunately associated with this are many misconceptions or myths. It is important that members of the merchant service community have a detailed understanding of PCI and can assist merchants with the complexities of compliance

Merchants are increasingly aware of the PCI DSS Self-Assessment Questionnaire (SAQ), a self-assessment that all
merchants who accept payment cards are mandated to perform every year.
Unlike the SAQ itself, the questions in the toolkit are worded simply and intelligibly so that most merchants,
regardless of their technical background or expertise in PCI, can answer the questions with yes, no or I don’t know.

The PCI TOOLKIT is the first and only integrated system, which leads the merchant through all of the steps necessary to comply with the MANDATED Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard.

“No organization that has been completely compliant with PCI has been compromised”. A. Bryan Sartin, Cybertrust Chief, Forensic Investigator May 2007