The Payments Association of South Africa (PASA) has announced that online and offline merchants will have to comply with PCI regulations by the end of 2013.

 According to the African Business Review, South African merchants will soon be aligned with European standards, from a payment security point of view, given that by the end of the year PCI Data Security Standard (DSS) compliance is expected of anyone involved in the storage or transmission of credit-card details.

Despite the complexity involved in compliance like IT adaptations, security applications, internal audits and more, it is believed that on top of the safety benefits, this move towards compliance could have certain advantages for commerce, according to Vaughan Alexander, Executive for Payments, at Innervation Value Added Services): “As compliance standards are enforced, so consumer confidence in electronic payment methods will increase. This will result in more cash being taken out of the system, reducing cash related costs, which amounts to around one to two percent of GDP.”

In addition, the e-commerce industry may also experience a change, and hopefully a boost, when anti-fraud technology is upgraded on online payment networks. 

Join the iFX EXPO Asia and discover your gateway to the Asian Markets