How to Stay PCI Compliant
As someone who runs a business that uses credit card processing for ecommerce, you may be wondering whether you’re staying compliant with all the transaction laws out there. With the volume of clients increasing during the coronavirus pandemic, there’s probably more pressure on your business’s online component to offer services to your customers that are safe and efficient.
This is where PCI (Payment Card Industry) compliance comes in. It’s a set of requirements that the credit card companies recommend in order to protect merchants and customers from fraudsters and identity thieves. As someone who runs a business with an online store component, it’s important to be aware of how PCI requirements affect your business so that you can avoid repercussions for non-compliant practices. Because face-to-face interactions at most businesses store have fallen sharply in favor of online transactions, understanding of PCI compliance is more important now than ever.
Define PCI Compliance
PCI compliance is not legally mandated. It’s not imposed by the government. However, compliance with the requirements is important for any business that has or plans on using a system of credit card processing for ecommerce. If your failure to comply leads to a data breach or fraudulent transaction, this can result in liability for you or your company. Failure to comply can also result in non-compliance fees being assessed by your payment processor.
The PCI requirements are designed to protect consumers from online stores that don’t take the proper steps to ensure that their cardholder’s data and personal information is protected when sent over their servers. The ways that PCI compliance is tested include technological and procedural aspects of your online store.
Are your systems compliant?
There are a few key aspects that should be checked to ensure your systems are PCI compliant, and this goes for any store that uses credit card processing for ecommerce, no matter how small.
Your data host cannot store customer data, and thereby put those customers at risk in the event that this data were to be accessed. You are also required to ensure that no outside hackers can get into the system and steal personal information.
One step in accomplishing this is by restricting server access to only a few key people and putting multiple layers of identification security in place. This includes encrypting your connections to protect your customers’ transaction data and changing all the default passwords on your internet merchant account so they’re not as easy to hack. Each employee with password access should have their own individual login and password, so that if any of them access your merchant account improperly, there will be a record of which employee did so–which in turn acts as a deterrent preventing employees from abusing their access or being careless with their login data.
The Takeaway
To avoid your business becoming liable for damages resulting from identity theft or fraud, you need to stay compliant with the PCI requirements. A business that does not take the proper precautions to ensure their customers’ safety can be held liable for damages if something imporper happens to any sensitive information on the business’s servers.
Contact charge.com at (888) 924-2743 to find a payment processor that will help you comply with the PCI requirements so that your business will be more protected if anything should go wrong.