Press Office

MasterCard Embarks on Australasian Merchant Security Education and Awareness Program.

Auckland, 3 November 2006 ¬ MasterCard Worldwide has embarked on a major information security awareness program aimed at card-accepting businesses and government entities across Australia and New Zealand.

Over the last month the Australasian PCI (Payment Card Industry) Working Group held a number of workshops focusing on the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) which assists merchants to safeguard cardholder data. Compliance with the PCI DSS enables businesses to better protect against financial liabilities, investigative costs and the risk of damage to their reputation.

The workshops reached more than 500 Australasian merchants to reinforce the importance of data security and facilitate adoption of the industry standards.

Joe Vukasovic, director of security and risk management, Australia and New Zealand, MasterCard Worldwide, said that merchants are making inroads to ensuring their data is secure but there is still work to be done.
“By getting in front of major merchants throughout Australasia we’re hoping that more of them will come to realize the importance of ensuring the security of payment card data for the sake of its customers and reputation.

“As a leader in the payments industry, MasterCard has always taken an active role in protecting cardholder data. We are committed to the security of payment card data of New Zealand businesses, and cardholders and we are committed to working with our customer financial institutions, merchants and processors,” Vukasovic said.

The PCI DSS program has been mandated by MasterCard for over 3 years and MasterCard has worked closely with its customer banks over the last year and a half to help facilitate the compliance of their merchants.
Vukasovic said that the way in which PCI DSS relates to individual businesses will depend on the size and nature of the business, the configuration of card acceptance systems and the service providers each organization works with.

A set of tools and resources has been created to ensure the implementation of (PCI DSS) is as seamless as possible for merchants. The PCI DSS has 12 basic requirements that focus on using secure systems which include installing a firewall, changing default passwords, protecting stored data, using anti-virus software and encrypting transmissions of cardholder data across public networks.