How to protect your eCommerce store and customers from fraud 

As an eCommerce store owner, there is more to worry about than just getting customers to your store. You need to concern yourself with the safety of your store, as well as the safety of those customers you’re bringing in. But why is this so important? 

Well, the reason is because the rate at which scammers and fraudulent customers are targeting eCommerce businesses nowadays is on a high. And if you don’t want your merchant to fall victim to any of their unscrupulous acts, then you need to concern yourself with how you’re going to protect it.   

Yes, you want to sell, and you want to do it real big. But are you going to jeopardize your brand reputation, endanger customers, and run down your business revenue doing so?  

Of course not!  

Therefore, you need to find a way to protect your eCommerce store and customers from fraud. But how are you going to do it? Read on to find out! 

Comply with all the standards of PCI 

There is a good reason why the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) – a forum of international card operators, including MasterCard, Visa, and American Express – has developed a set of compulsory rules for all merchants, and Card-not-present online retailers to follow.  

For your own good and the good of your customers, please make sure that you follow the PCI SSC laid down standards to the latter. Although complying with these standards is not optional, it is not uncommon to find store owners struggling to keep up with the requirements. 

The good news! 

Your payment processor can help you out with your PCI compliance in case you get stuck anywhere, and if you don’t even know how to go about it, they can help you handle the entire process. Many payment processors like iPayTotal build PCI compliance into the payment processing service they offer you. So before you start receiving payments or if you aren’t satisfied with the payment procedure on your store, feel free to reach out to iPayTotal today to discuss the details of working out your PCI compliance. 

PCI compliance is there to help safeguard customers’ data so that they don’t fall into the wrong hands while they’re in your store. Also, it helps safeguard your store from being exploited by fraudulent cardholders or impersonators. 

Limit your risk 

Although there might be a potential for fraudsters to exploit loopholes in your store system, you don’t have to accept that as a norm. There are tools and processes that can help you stay protected. Below are a few recommendations from iPayTotal. 

Use fraud filters 

This could be in the form of the Address Verification System (AVS) or Card Verification Value (CVV). For AVS, you’d be comparing the numeric parts of the billing address stored on a card to the address on file at the card issuer’s company. For CVV, you’d be asking the customer to supply you with a code that can only be accessible at the back of the actual card. Unless stolen, if the person initiating the transaction on your store is not the actual card owner, there’s no way they’d have this code. As such, they won’t be able to checkout on your store. 

Both AVS and CVV are really effective in combating fraud in most eCommerce stores. But be sure to check with your payment processor to know whether their service supports fraud filters. Of course, you wouldn’t need to double-check anything if you’re using iPayTotal because their service supports these tools.  

Set transaction limit 

Nobody knows your business better than you. So, you should know the kinds of transactions that often come in. Using this revenue information, you can set transaction limits to accept or reject any transaction that falls out of this range. The reason for this is so that you can reduce your liability to a minimum in the event that a fraud eventually occurs. This tip is particularly crucial if you’re running a high-risk merchant business. Because even if you’re lucky to find a payment processor like iPayTotal who’s willing to help deal with your liability through their high-risk merchant accounts offer, you don’t want to push your luck too much.  

Monitor every transaction 

If you’re still a small business merchant, it can be easy for you to track every one of the transactions happening in your store. But for a big merchant, you might want to speak with a software engineer to help you devise a transaction tracking tool. 

But what exactly are you looking to track? Well, you want to keep an eye on all red flags that might be pointing to fraudulent activities. This could be inconsistent billing and shipping information, orders coming from countries that have an alarming scam rate, and customers using free or anonymous email addresses. 

Don’t accept wishy-washy passwords 

While on your store, ensure that customers use strong passwords only so that it would be near-impossible for fraudsters to have a breakthrough while trying to hack their passwords.   

You can mandate that any customer in your store should use at least ten characters and alphanumeric passwords only. Although some customers might say they prefer to use simple passwords like “1234” so that they won’t forget, be sure to make them understand that it is for their own safety.  

Share this story