ATTENTION ALL E-COMMERCE SITES!!!

If you are presently operating, or plan to operate an e-commerce site, please read this information!

E-commerce sites are web sites that sell products and/or services on the Internet and they accept payment in the form of credit card or some other online payment method.  If your site does this, you need to be aware of recent changes in the way e-commerce companies are allowed to do business.

What is PCI Compliance?

The Payment Card Industry (PCI), which includes Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover and others have developed a Data Security Standard (DSS) to substantially reduce the amount of credit card exposure to hackers and other criminals, and reduce or eliminate fraud.  These standards are no longer optional, if you operate an online e-commerce business, you MUST adhere to these rules and standards.

These standards include daily scanning of your web site by an Approved Scanning Vendor (ASV) and your e-commerce web site application must also follow the Payment Application Best Practices (PABP).  This means that your web developer needs to follow these standards when building your application in order to be compliant with your merchant account provider.

There are generally two aspects that need to be followed for merchants to operate an e-commerce business today:

1. Host your web site on a secure and PCI compliant network - The Gizmo Beach network is certified to be PCI compliant and we run daily scans of our network by Scan Alert and our Hacker Safe logo on our home page reflects this.
2. Build your web site e-commerce application according to PABP - the Payment Application Best Practices is a guideline for web developers to follow in order to build compliant web applications.

The links below have more detailed information what is necessary to have your e-commerce application compliant in order to do business.

General Information for Merchants

• Visa USA's PCI/CISP program overview
• QSA Feedback Form
• Confirmation of Report Accuracy - (Word Doc - 123 KB)
• Mastercard SDP Program
• PCI DSS Security Scanning Procedures
• Hacker Safe / Scan Alert
• Visa Cardholder Information Security Program
• Scan Alert Comprehensive Security Policy

Web Developer Information

• Payment Application Best Practices (PABP) - (Word Doc - 434 KB)
• Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP)
• OWASP Documentation - (Zip file - 1,463 KB)

Gizmo Beach is a Hacker Safe site and we can offer deep discounts on the Hacker Safe logo.  Sites that are Hacker Safe and display the Hacker Safe Logo, can notice a 14% increase in customer sales!  We can provide you with substantial discounts on getting set up with Scan Alert to receive daily scans of your web site application. These daily scans help you sort out any vulnerabilities that need to be resolved to become PCI compliant.

It is HIGHLY recommended that all merchants sign up for the Hacker Safe program with us.*  You can sign up with any Approved Scanning Vendor (ASV), but you won't receive the deep discount that we can offer you.

If you want your site to be Hacker Safe, contact our Sales department at 1-877-449-6623 (877-GIZMOBEACH) and you can receive a 57% discount on the retail cost of the certification!  (Retail cost is $1,890.00/year)

* - This offer is only available to those customers who host with Gizmo Beach.