With EMV Coming, Payment Security Becomes Job 1
Payment security is top of mind for retailers this year, according to a study released this week from Boston Retail Partners (BRP). And, based on the numbers, it seems as though many retailers haven’t paid payment security much attention in recent years: 63% of respondents said this type of security was among their top three concerns, the highest number in the history of the 16-year-old survey.
Part of that commitment to secure transactions has to do with the rollout of EMV, also known as chip cards or chip and pin cards. While widespread in Europe, EMV is just rolling out in the United States. All retailers will be required to have EMV readers available by October 2015, or they face being liable for charges incurred by bogus cards. It is therefore not surprising that retailers are set to jump on solutions securing payment transactions; what is unusual is that the number of retailers planning to support EMV is expected to increase by 650%.
Last year’s seeming epidemic of breaches at several top retailers, in addition to high profile hacking on top of the approaching October 2015 EMV deadline, is giving security this sudden sense of urgency. But chip and pin aren’t the only weapons in the arsenal.
Survey respondents report implementing end-to-end encryption: 35% have already put solutions in place and another 45% plan to implement it by October. Overall, BRP projects a 151% increase in encryption within two years.
Finally, tokenization use will see a hike of 146% during the next five years. Tokenization lets retailers remove sensitive data in flight and at rest from their networks. One-third of the respondents have implemented tokenization for payment processing and another 40% plan to implement it before October 2015. One-third of the respondents have implemented tokenization for payment processing and another 40% plan to implement it before October 2015.
Increasingly, retailers are looking toward modern payment security solutions to protect sensitive customer and organization data. By moving to EMV and encryption in conjunction with tokenization, 2015 may be the beginning of a more secure retail environment.
