Cardholder signatures, both at the point of sale and on the backs of credit and debit cards, will now be optional for Mastercard customers worldwide. The move will speed checkout, and shoppers using contactless payment methods won’t need to worry about providing a signature.
Mastercard had eliminated its signature requirements for transactions in the U.S. and Canada in April 2018, the same month when competitors Visa, American Express and Discover also made signatures optional.
Additionally, an industrywide initiative designed to improve the security of online and other Card Not Present (CNP) transactions took a step forward today. EMVco, the industry consortium owned by American Express, Discover, JCB, Mastercard, UnionPay and Visa, released a draft version of its Secure Remote Commerce specification on Oct. 19. The release kicks off a 45-day public comment period that concludes on Dec. 3, 2018.
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When the SRC specification is finalized in 2019, it is expected to:
• Define interfaces to allow for secure exchanges of payment data across participants in the digital commerce environment;
• Accommodate options for using dynamic data, such as cryptograms or other unique transaction data, to enhance security on a retailer’s SRC-enabled web site, mobile app or other e-Commerce platform;
• Enable compatibility with other technologies, such as EMV Payment Tokenization and EMV 3D Secure; and
• Facilitate consumer recognition of a common user experience that will be indicated by an SRC Mark, indicating that a retailer’s e-Commerce environment is enabled for EMV SRC.
For its part, Mastercard plans to enhance POS and online payment security with a number of initiatives between now and 2020:
• Enter Customer Info 1x: By the middle of 2019, all Mastercard products will include Secure Remote Commerce (SRC), which allows consumers to enter purchase information one time and apply it anywhere they shop online, reducing the multiple steps needed to fill out the same information at each different site.
• Authentication: Mastercard Identity Check, which simplifies how merchants and banks upgrade their security, will extend to all merchants in early 2019 following a pilot with 130 merchants globally. Based on EMV 3-D Secure (3DS) technology, this enables consumers to authenticate themselves when making CNP purchases, providing another level of security for both merchants and consumers.
• Tokenization: All Mastercard credit cards will be token-ready by 2020. Since tokens use a different, encrypted string of characters in place of the card number for each new transaction, consumers be able to store their card credentials across multiple businesses without the risk of exposing actual card account details.
Mastercard also is working to bring EMV-like security to a range of digital environments. The company is working with Adyen, BlueSnap, Digital River, Stripe, Square, Worldpay and Mastercard Payment Gateway Services to extend tokens to thousands of retailers. Additionally, Mastercard is working directly with card issuers such as Citi and Fifth Third Bank to convert cards on file into tokens, and with Bank of America to provide enhanced fraud scoring to help increase approval rates over time.
