Visa, Mastercard roll out secure, seamless payment system for South Africa

Hassles involved in online merchant payments in South Africa, usually from step-up challenge, will soon be reduced as two payment card providers Visa and Mastercard are rolling out new authentication frameworks.

According to Business Tech, Visa unveiled its Digital Authentication Framework (DAF) mid last month, while Mastercard plans to roll out its Token Authentication Framework (TAK) sometime next year.

The two new authentication systems will reduce the friction for merchant payments and enable customers complete the checkout process faster than before, without any compromise on security.

Elizabeth Graham, Product Manager of Payments at digital payments anti-fraud solution provider Entersekt says the new systems will have “the express purpose of significantly reducing unnecessary payment friction while still ensuring customer security.”

She mentions that reducing the friction in payment authentication and other related challenges “might be a very welcome change for them – especially those who are used to shopping on international sites where faster checkout is the norm.”

Visa says its new framework means that once a customer has been authenticated on a merchant platform, all subsequent processes will be done in line with the DAF framework rules.

Another significant aspect in the novelty is that Visa has made issuers liable for fraud on authenticated transactions that meet the DAF requirements, reports Tech Financials.

The publication quotes Graham as stating that “larger merchants will likely be the first to take advantage of the program and then news of its benefits will filter down to the smaller ones,” although “those who do choose to be early adopters would certainly enjoy an immediate boost to their customer experience when they offer faster checkout.”

Entersekt, which announced a deal last year with a South African bank to enable payment security with behavioral biometrics from Mastercard subsidiary NuData for online commerce customers, has been involved in secure digital payment projects in South Africa over the years.

Article Topics

biometric authentication  |  Entersekt  |  Mastercard  |  secure transactions  |  South Africa  |  Visa