InfoBytes Blog
Payment Network Providers Seek Collaboration On Digital Payment Standard
On October 1, three payment network providers proposed that industry stakeholders collaborate on a token-based global security standard for online and mobile commerce. To meet growing consumer demand for secure digital transactions, the providers propose replacing traditional account numbers with a digital payment “token” for online and mobile transactions. They argue that tokens provide an additional layer of security and eliminate the need for merchants, digital wallet operators or others to store account numbers. The proposed standard used to generate tokens would be based on existing industry standards and would be available to all payment networks and other payment participants. The providers identify the following as key elements of the proposed standard: (i) new data fields to provide richer information about the transaction, which can help improve fraud detection and expedite the approval process, (ii) consistent methods to identify and verify a consumer before replacing the traditional card account number with a token, and (iii) a common standard designed to simplify the process for merchants for contactless, online or other transactions. The proposed standard incorporates comments from card issuers and merchants, and the participants intend to seek further collaboration from standard-setting bodies and other stakeholders.