CHANTILLY, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--3Delta Systems, Inc. (3DSI), a leader in online credit card processing solutions and a pioneer in safeguarding confidential payment data through tokenization, today observed the 10^th anniversary of National Cyber Security Awareness Month by issuing 10 tried-and-true best practices for businesses to use in protecting their customers’ credit card account information and minimizing their own exposure to online payment scams.

Entitled “Top 10 Business Best Practices for Fighting Credit Card Theft and Fraud,” 3DSI’s free tips consist of real-world advice, tools and techniques for companies to use in detecting credit card fraud and preventing thieves from stealing sensitive customer payment data from their computer systems. The best practices are available for download from 3Delta Systems’ site.

“Keeping customer cardholder data safe to avoid becoming the next data breach headline is a challenge for any size company,” said Rick Ricker, vice president for enterprise payment solutions at 3Delta Systems. “Once inside a system, many cyber attackers become entrenched. They lie low, undetected for months or even years, using advanced malware and obfuscation techniques to fly under the radar of security controls, all the while surreptitiously stealing funds and/or data. Often, they and their accomplices are well-funded by crime groups from nations where security and enforcement are lax and financial fraud is difficult to prosecute.”

Study after study shows that failure to protect sensitive payment data from a breach leads to massive financial costs, customer defections, lawsuits, and loss of reputation.

According to recent LexisNexis research, e-commerce merchants are paying $2.79 in costs for every dollar of fraud losses they incur, largely because of a spike in online malware and data breaches.

Cybercriminals are also increasingly targeting employees who have privileged access to sensitive information in the hopes of compromising the keys to their company’s data kingdom. A whopping 54 percent of more than 700 IT security executives at Fortune 1000 firms admitted in a recent ESG study that it’s more difficult to detect and prevent insider attacks today than two years ago. Another 46 percent said they remained vulnerable to an insider threat attack despite their existing security skills and resources.

Any business that accepts or processes credit cards or purchase cards (p-cards) online, in a store, by phone or by mail must protect and restrict access to that data according to 12 specific Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS) established by the major credit card brands that make up the PCI Security Standards Council.

“Unless it’s absolutely necessary to retain payment or cardholder data, don’t,” Ricker added. “Because credit card data must be secured at every point, complying with PCI rules as well as building and defending one’s own data fortress can be extraordinarily difficult and prohibitively expensive. Businesses that collect and store that data often find the process to be a huge headache with potentially significant liabilities rather than a convenience for their customers. Tokenization has become one of the best strategic weapons for protecting information by securing the data itself, rather than just the path to that data. This process safely replaces a customer’s real 16-digit credit card numbers or bank account data with a randomly generated string of characters called tokens, which then become useless to would-be hackers. Transferring sensitive credit card and payment transaction data off site, where it is encrypted and stored at highly secure, PCI-compliant processing centers, is often the best solution.”

3Delta Systems, which has met the strictest PCI compliance requirements for payment data security 10 years in a row, pioneered credit card tokenization technology in 2003 called CardVault^® that enables merchants to exchange their customers’ confidential card data for randomly generated payment “tokens,” a process that safely replaces real card numbers with a string of characters which then become useless to would-be thieves. Merchants use only the token key reference for each customer transaction while the real card data remains offsite at 3DSI’s secure processing centers.

National Cyber Security Awareness Month, conducted every October by the National Cyber Security Alliance, heightens awareness of cyber security issues and promotes best practices for online safety among businesses, governments and the general public. More information about the organization and this annual awareness-raising initiative can be found at www.staysafeonline.org.

About 3Delta Systems

3Delta Systems, Inc. – based in Chantilly, VA – is a payment solutions company whose innovative, Internet-based systems for processing credit cards and purchase cards deliver peace of mind to B2B and B2G customers by increasing their productivity, cutting operating costs, lowering business risk and strengthening security. 3DSI’s complete suite of payment solutions are designed from the ground up to be scalable, easy to implement and conform with PCI Data Security Standard best practices so that merchants and buyers can manage, authorize and settle credit card and p-card transactions in real time. 3Delta Systems processes more than 1 million transactions per month worth over $1 billion for more than 10,000 merchant accounts and 30,000 users who handle corporate and government payments. Since 1999, 3DSI has served more than 6,000 corporations and government agencies. For more information, visit www.3DSI.com. You can also follow us on LinkedIn.