Why Privacy and Security Compliance are Important (read: Mandatory)
Think about your company and your privacy and cybersecurity initiatives. Now, choose the appropriate answer: “PCI compliance for our organization is”
a) important,
b) a hassle,
c) mandatory,
d) smart
The correct answer is A, C, D and —all too often —B.
Anytime you or your company handles sensitive information, cybersecurity is a concern. Ignoring or not implementing cybersecurity compliance best practices can be a costly mistake. The risks of not incorporating PCI compliance into your payment solutions include:
- Industry fines for non-compliance
- Increased risk of data breaches
- Fines and lawsuits that result from data breaches
- Government intervention (FTC has sued companies for prior security breaches))
- A loss of customer confidence
For any organization that accepts or handles credit card data and transactions, compliance with Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standards should be a given. The moment your company accepts your users’ payment information, as well as any other sensitive data about your customers and/or students means that compliance with industry security standards should be paramount for you, as well as any SaaS payment processing tools.
PCI is a collection of best practices that the major credit card companies have identified as crucial security concerns,organized into 12 core areas. While the certification process is a snapshot of your strengths at a given moment in time, true PCI compliance is a continuous process.
Takeaway: PCI doesn’t end when you get a letter of compliance.
The good news is that there are solutions that can ease the burden of achieving compliance:
- Working with solution providers that help to take your processes out of scope.
- Look for providers that tokenize sensitive data so that information never touches your systems.
- Look for providers that take the need to store sensitive information off of your plate.
- Working with providers that build their platforms specifically for the needs of your organization.
- When possible, find partners that are not only familiar with the requirements of the payments industry but who also understand your specific industry and implementation.