Technology

“De-scope to protect customer payment details from hackers” urges PCI Pal, in light of high-profile data breaches

Following reports* of a significant data breach by Dixons Carphone’s, which has involved 5.9 million payment cards and 1.2 million personal data records, PCI Pal encourages businesses to step-up protection and use de-scoping payment security technologies to halt hackers in their bid to access sensitive payment data.

Confirms Richard Brown, President ‎- Sales EMEA of PCI Pal: “Today, businesses can avoid storing sensitive card data on their internal infrastructure. If de-scoping technologies are used for payments handled via a contact centre, the sensitive data never enters the enterprise and therefore the risk is removed. Businesses face huge ramifications from breaches of this kind – not only from fines but from the impact on customers’ trust in the brand.

Continues Brown: “Payment card data is the ultimate prize for hackers, so you need to look at ways to stop your business from being on their target list. Systems, people and processes are all vulnerability points; the first step is to secure customer data and brand reputation by using payment card de-scoping technologies that ensure Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) compliance and ultimately improve the ongoing security of all telephone, IVR, web and SMS financial transactions.”

PCI Pal’s cloud-based AgentAssist supports multiple global brands in achieving PCI DSS compliance, by using DTMF technologies whereby customers key in personal payment information into a telephone keypad. It then automatically routes to the payment processor and eliminates the need for any sensitive payment data to ever enter an organisation’s internal systems. Throughout this process, the customer is still able to talk to the agent who can maintain their customer experience and eliminate drop-out from the call.

PCI Pal secures payments for some of the largest companies in a range of markets, including retail, services, logistics, and utilities.

* https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-44465331
* https://news.sky.com/story/hacking-targets-customers-of-currys-pc-world-11403182