Experts disagree over security breach cause, solutions

February 13th, 2010 | by admin |

More than a year after 100 million credit card numbers were stolen from Heartland Payment Systems, two industry experts disagreed over who was at fault.

This information is currently protected by the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council, which sets 12 specific goals to build and maintain secure networks. Compliance with PCI standards is mandatory for all companies storing or processing payment card identification. Heartland executives originally said they were compliant, but later disclosed that assessors incorrectly informed the company.

In a report by NetworkWorld, Lieberman Software CEO Phil Lieberman said improved payment technology could be used to prevent future security breaches, which can be devastating to consumers’ credit scores. This smart card technology would remove liability from merchants and processors, while minimizing card cloning.

“Card issuers are able to transfer all liability for credit card losses to merchants and processors even though they have the ability to stop almost all losses from fraud and account disclosure,” Lieberman said.

Henry Helgeson, CEO of Merchant Warehouse, argued in the report that it was the merchant’s responsibility to strengthen security measures. Off-site servers, which store cardholder data on a separate network, and MagTek’s fingerprint-scanning technology would reduce large-scale fraud, he said.

“It’s now up to the industry to begin adopting the technology available in order to more securely lock down the sensitive, personal information that is transacted every day,” Helgeson said. “Adopting these technologies will allow for more efficient and seamless business and a stronger faith in the financial system.”

Payment card data was stolen in 84 percent of the 285 million security breaches recorded last year, according to the 2009 Verizon Business Data Breach Report. Other recent incidents include the TJX breach, where credit and debit card information was stolen from 45.7 million consumers, and last year’s breach at Network Solutions, which compromised 573,000 credit and debit accounts.

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Payment card data was stolen in 84 percent of last year’s security breaches.

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