What Is Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCI SSC)?
The Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (Short for PCI SSC) was established in 2006 and tasked to manage various security standards for credit card or financial transaction data. The technology for e-commerce uses these standards, as do other helpful setups for mercantile processes, such as retail point-of-sale installations. The PCI SSC has its logo, which is a bit like the US Department of Defense's logo in that it looks like a shield with arrows pointing outward from the center. The PCI SSC's shield is blue with gold trim and bears the letters "PCI" in white. Major credit card companies founded the PCI SSC after significant security breaches at retailers selling products online or through kiosks. These breaches resulted in millions of dollars’ worth of lost customer information and caused many people to stop using their credit cards altogether. The PCI Security Standards Council was assembled to create standards for how merchants handle customer information and other sensitive data related to payment processing. Those standards include things like physical security measures (such as cameras), logical access controls (like passwords), encryption methods, incident response policies, etcetera. The PCI SSC is a group of people who ensure that your credit card data is safe. They make sure that you're safe, too! So, what does this mean? Well, they want to ensure that your credit card data is always safe. Whether it's being transmitted over the internet or stored on your phone, they want to ensure that it's encrypted and protected from hackers. The PCI SSC also helps companies discover vulnerabilities in their security systems, so they can fix them before someone else does. The PCI SSC consists of various corporate participants that oversee the implementation of comprehensive security programs for financial transactions. These corporate participants include Visa, MasterCard, Discover, American Express, and JCB.
Related Terms by Financial Technology
Join Our Newsletter
Get weekly news, engaging articles, and career tips-all free!
By subscribing to our newsletter, you're cool with our terms and conditions and agree to our Privacy Policy.