If your business uses credit card payment, PCI DSS is an essential part of protecting your customers’ payment card data and protecting your business from facing the consequences of a data breach. The rise in data breaches has led to the rise in changes and rules of PCI DSS.
The unfortunate thing in this present world is that credit card fraud is rising day by day, causing more harm than good for small businesses. This is what makes the protection of payment card data vital, and PCI DSS has set strict measures to protect this sensitive data. In this article, you will learn what PCI DSS is, the requirements, who can use PCI DSS PASS, and how important it is for your business.
What is PCI DSS?
PCI DSS means Payment Card Industry Security Standard (PCI DSS). It is a set of security standards used by development companies and businesses to increase payment card data security and reduce the risk of credit card fraud. It was founded in 2004 by four credit card companies such as Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Discover.
Who can use PCI DSS?
PCI DSS is a standard that every entity, organization, or business must follow. This is very important to any business that processes any credit card transaction. Most of us think those that can use PCI DSS are banks and Fintech companies, but that is not true, though, banks can also be beneficiaries of this, but it is meant for any business that accepts payment cards as a means of payment.
It is very important for you as a business owner to take this into account when you are hiring a payment provider. Make sure they comply with the PCI DSS regulation as they should.
The data of the cardholder that PCI DSS protects for businesses, either for storage, transactions, authentication, or process, are:
- Primary Account Number (PAN)
- Cardholder Name
- Expiration date
- service code
And the authentication such as:
- Magnetic stripe or chip data
- CVV or CVC card verification code
- A personal identification number and PIN blocks
Benefits of PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) for Businesses
Builds trust with your customers
PCI DSS is a custom software design to help build trust with your customer. And trust is what will determine the success of every e-commerce business. When you use PCI DSS, your customer will trust you to send the actual item they have purchased and that their payment details are saved.
PCI DSS has a way of building and protecting your business reputation as this is one of your business’s most valuable assets.
Prevents data breaches
PCI DSS is very important when it comes to building a software development company, IT infrastructure, especially if you process or store customer payment card data. This is because merchants are required to use stronger encryption and are not allowed to retain cardholder details with them.
Once there is a presence of PCI DSS in your business, then you are not at risk of cybercriminals. It helps to prevent breaches because hackers will have a hard time hacking your data and won’t find the data they are looking for.
Helps you to meet global standards
PCI DSS regulation is beneficial to software professionals and business owners because It helps you meet global standards. This is because the regulation was initiated by 5 of the world’s most influential credit card organizations to protect customers by ensuring that business owners meet a high standard of security.
This security is done when cardholder data is stored, processed, and transmitted. Achieving PCI DSS compliance allows you to meet your competition’s standard globally and businesses committed to data security and customer protection.
Puts security first
The benefit of PCI DSS is that they put your security first and that of your security. Due to this compliance, you have multiple layers of security that are correctly configured. If you are a mobile app development agency, PCI DSS also stands as a secure medium for you. PCI regulation in your business can be met if you use IT security services such as vulnerability audit.
Provides a baseline for other regulations
For small and big businesses, achieving PCI DSS compliance is crucial to protecting customer data. Some of the basic premises of PCI DSS, like taking action to limit the amount of sensitive data you store, dovetail well with GDPR, ISO, and other internationally-mandated data security regulations.
Avoid expensive fines and fees.
Meeting the PCI DSS standard is a great advantage to your business because you won’t have to pay any fines or fees again. After all, those fees can cause backwardness to your business. However, the failure to comply with PCI DSS regulations could result to the end of your business.
Increase your peace of mind.
As a business owner, many things are going through your mind, so focusing on many things at a time is a distraction. So, maintaining PCI compliance is a great way to increase your peace of mind over security. Maintaining the standard will give you confidence that your business, your data, and customers’ data are secure.
The 12 requirements of PCI DSS
The requirements set to maintain PCI DSS are operational and technical, focusing on protecting cardholder data.
The 12 requirements of PCI DSS are:
- Install and maintain a firewall configuration to protect cardholder data
- Do not use vendor-supplied defaults for system passwords and other security parameters
- Protect stored cardholder data
- Encrypt transmission of cardholder data across open, public networks
- Use and regularly update anti-virus software or programs
- Develop and maintain secure systems and applications
- Restrict access to cardholder data by business need to know
- Assign a unique ID to each person with computer access
- Restrict physical access to cardholder data
- Track and monitor all access to network resources and cardholder data
- Regularly test security systems and processes
- Maintain a policy that addresses information security for all personnel
Conclusion
Cybercriminals are taking advantage of the rise in digital transactions and exploiting system vulnerabilities to access sensitive cardholder data. To combat this fraudulent activity, it is vital that your organization is PCI DSS compliant and take all necessary steps to secure payment transactions and protect customer data.
Ensuring that your business doesn’t go against these standards is the best way to avoid being scammed or cybercrime. It will also allow you to stop paying fines to the Payment Card Industry. Hanna Shnaider is a certified PCI Qualified Security Assessor (QSA), authorized to assess businesses against the PCI DSS standard so that she can maintain high levels of ongoing security of sensitive data for your business.
