Minnesota Becomes First State To Mandate PCI
Written by Evan SchumanThis week, Minnesota became the first state to mandate PCI requirements for retailers who want to be protected from banks and credit unions for data breach losses.
The Plastic Card Security Act kicks in in August, according to this St. Paul Pioneer Press story. Minnesota is not likely to be the last state to put its weight behind PCI, with Texas, Massachusetts and Nevada–among others–heading down similar paths.
“It’s a credit-card world. If you’re in business in this day and age, you have to be able to accept credit-card and debit-card transactions,” Buzz Anderson of the Minnesota Retailers Association, which opposed the bill and argued for pushing back the penalty deadline, told the newspaper. The penalties from Visa and MasterCard can run to hundreds of thousands of dollars, he added, and act as a significant deterrent. Those penalties, he said, “would drive most small businesses out of business.”
Cards issued by European banks when used online cross border don't usually support AVS checks. So, when a European card is used with a billing address that's in the US, an ecom merchant wouldn't necessarily know that the shipping zip code doesn't match the billing code.
-Marc
