Firethorn Holdings, a Georgia-based Qualcomm company, has upgraded its mobile banking and payments application to adhere to the industry’s benchmark for secure credit card transactions – the Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard (DSS).
The PCI DSS is a set of comprehensive requirements for payment account data security, addressing policies, procedures, network architecture, software design and other critical measures to protect customer account data. It was developed by the founding payment brands of the PCI Security Standards Council(TM).
Firethorn said that the new additions would allow Firethorn’s financial institutions, wireless operator and merchant clients to offer mobile commerce options, such as contactless payments, and other point-of-sale transactions, such as gift cards and loyalty rewards.
Firethorn’s methods to protect customer data include encryption of account information at rest and in transit, monitoring for malicious activity, and providing security awareness training for all support staff. It says that it conducts regular security assessments of its mobile services to verify that security measures are working appropriately. It also claims that the company has met numerous PCI DSS requirements by relocating its mobile services operation to a protected data center that provides 24/7 support for all Firethorn services.
Tripp Rackley, President of Firethorn, said: “Our goal at Firethorn is to provide an easy, new way for consumers to use their mobile devices for payments and other mobile commerce transactions, and to enhance security by meeting or exceeding the toughest industry standards. We have worked hard to make sure our solution provides a level of protection that exceeds our partners’ and consumers’ expectations. Firethorn’s latest service upgrades enable our partners to enact a wide range of innovative mobile commerce implementations with the confidence that their sensitive information is protected by tested and accepted security measures.
