FAIRFAX, Va.– The Electronic Funds Transfer Association (EFTA) has released “User Authentication for Payments,” a white paper and free resource for the payments industry.
The full report is available at no charge at http://efta.org/2016/07/understanding-payments-authentication/
It is the first of a three-part series.
As an association that represents large financial institutions, payment processors, software companies, card companies and ATM networks, the EFTA said it has prepared this white paper to address the importance of user authentication for all stakeholders in the payments industry. The paper describes the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC) guidelines on how a multi-layered, dynamic and out-of-band authentication provides the best level of protection against a compromise in the payment transaction while also protecting consumers’ personal data. Authentication techniques described in the report include:
- Static/dynamic biometrics
- Financial institution PIN
- Device fingerprint
- Knowledge-based access
- One-time password generated in hardware or software
“There has been significant activity in the payment industry to support EMV chip cards and tokenization as measures to combat consumer card fraud,” said Kurt Helwig, president and CEO of the EFTA. “However, for consumers who shop online or use online banking services, the bigger concern is identity theft and account takeover. Given the ever advancing tactics by increasingly emboldened fraudsters, it’s imperative for the payments industry to work as a whole utilizing innovative solutions to keep up with the war against fraud.”
Part two of the series will focus on the benefits, challenges and development of industry standards around user authentication as well as provide a clear call to action for implementation.