Mercury Launches ‘Security Pays' Initiative To Improve Payments Security

• Working with RSPA and PCI Security Standards Council, Mercury provides education for payments partners
• Mercury offering onsite enrollment, testing and training at 2015 RetailNow in Orlando

Mercury Payment Systems, a Vantiv company and a provider of payments technology and services for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), announced recently its Security Pays initiative, designed to educate payments partners and business owners on how to protect their businesses from the multitude of security threats facing them today. Mercury is working to drive adoption of security standards, protocols and products across the industry to help payments partners and their business customers protect themselves.

“Securing payment data is more important than ever for businesses,” said Matt Taylor, group president integrated payments and emerging channels, at Vantiv. “Research shows that 80 percent of security attacks happen at small businesses, and 60 percent of the small businesses that are hit by a data breach, go out of business within six months of the breach.¹ We want to help our payments partners – and the businesses they serve – to take steps to be more secure. When it comes to security, it’s crucial to be proactive.”

Through the Security Pays initiative, Mercury is supplying resources to point of sale (POS) developers to accelerate security software integration work to the Mercury payments platform. The program also includes incentives for the developers, dealers and their staff to focus on practicing secure behaviors as well as selling more secure solutions.

“We’re on a mission to help businesses of all sizes protect themselves and their clients against the ever evolving set of threats,” said Matt Downs, senior vice president of channel for Vantiv integrated payments. “Our merchants’ business survival depends on it, as well as the vitality of our channel partners across the developer and reseller network. We believe the POS provider is the key to changing this troubling narrative.”

Through Security Pays, Mercury is making it easy for payments partners to receive training and testing to meet Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) version 3.1 requirements. This important qualification program culminates when payments partners are certified as Qualified Integrators and Resellers (QIR), an important three-year renewable credential that can create differentiation for point-of-sale dealers and developers.

¹ Trustwave 2013 Global Security Report. (2013, February 21). Retrieved April 10, 2015.

“In the more than 400 investigations conducted by the U.S. Secret Service last year, the Service found improper payment platform set up and system maintenance to be a common point of attack and compromise. We also see this across the global marketplace,” said PCI Security Standards Council general manager Stephen W. Orfei. “As U.S. businesses migrate to EMV and update their Point-of-Sale environments, they need to be confident the technology is set up correctly to protect their customer base. Taking this risk off the table is significant. The Council applauds Mercury and RSPA for their commitment to train merchant partners through the QIR program. The right training will ensure merchants who are trying to do all the right things have the resources they need to protect themselves and their customers.”

Today, at the Retail Solutions Providers Association (RSPA) trade show RetailNow, in Orlando, Fla., which runs from August 2-5, RSPA and Mercury announced a partnership and expansion in the certification program. RSPA’s professional development offering for members will now include discounted access to the PCI QIR certification. At RetailNow members will actually be able to take the test for the QIR certification onsite. On the trade show floor, Mercury’s payments experts will demonstrate for partners and businesses how to fight the threats facing them, including fraud, data compromise, non-compliance and the resulting financial impacts, and explain all the aspects of the Security Pays initiative.

“We are thrilled to announce and promote this opportunity at RetailNOW this year,” said Kelly Funk, president and chief executive officer of RSPA. “With the EMV liability shift creating more awareness around payments security and many of our members looking to expand their knowledge and competitive edge, offering the QIR testing at the point of sale technology’s industry event is a wonderful way to increase and promote security awareness.”

By participating in Security Pays, developers and dealers will be empowered to quickly institute critical security standards and adopt products that will help them integrate the added security benefits of end-to-end encryption, tokenization and EMV acceptance. The participating developer and dealer partners are also equipped with a subsidy for businesses to financially assist these merchants with the necessary security hardware or software upgrades required for the upcoming liability shift.

“Even as we move toward advanced technology solutions such as EMV chip, tokenization and point-to-point encryption, data security is foundational and must be part of any payment system,” said Sonia Sng, senior director of data security and third party risk, Visa Inc. “We’re pleased to work with Mercury, Vantiv, RSPA and the PCI Security Standards Council to help ensure payment partners build and install payment solutions that protect their business customers from data breaches.”

The Security Pays campaign runs through the end of 2015. visit http://www.mercurypay.com/security-pays for further information on the program and to enroll. For more information about Mercury, visit mercurypay.com.

About RSPA
RSPA accelerates the success of our members in the point of sale technology ecosystem by providing knowledge and connections. We annually host two signature events, RetailNOW and INSPIRE to provide live, face-to-face education and networking. Other member benefits include professional development and certification programming, a legal hotline, webinars, discounted shipping and event access, industry advocacy, as well as several publications. Learn more by going to www.GoRSPA.org.

About Mercury Payment Systems
Mercury Payment Systems, a Vantiv company, is simplifying business by partnering with software companies and technology services firms to embed payment processing in front and back office applications.

Mercury's commerce technology is integrated into a broad set of point of sale systems, reaching merchants through an extensive partner network of more than 3,000 point-of-sale software developers and value-added resellers. Mercury's award-winning customer service and value-added solutions help merchants streamline their business and build revenue through simple to use commerce solutions. For more information, visit www.mercurypay.com.

About Vantiv, Inc.
Vantiv, Inc. is a leading payment processor differentiated by an integrated technology platform. Vantiv offers a comprehensive suite of traditional and innovative payment processing and technology solutions to merchants and financial institutions of all sizes, enabling them to address their payment processing needs through a single provider. We build strong relationships with our clients, helping them become more efficient, more secure and more successful. Vantiv is the second largest merchant acquirer and the largest PIN debit acquirer based on number of transactions in the U.S. The company's growth strategy includes expanding further into high-growth channels and verticals, including integrated payments, ecommerce, and merchant bank.