In our digital world, keeping your personal information secure is much easier said than done. And as contactless payments start to make their way into the mainstream, security has been on the forefront of consumers minds. So far, Apple Pay has held up well, leaving consumers minds at ease knowing their information is secure. But even though consumers can rest easy, it still leaves businesses wondering whether or not Apple Pay is secure for them. The last place a business wants to be is on the news because they’ve had a breach in their security or fell victim to a massive amount of credit card fraud. Ask Target, they know what it feels like.
Businesses, especially small businesses, can get destroyed by fraudulent transactions and security breaches. While most businesses have a check i.d. policy in place and try to find ways to prevent credit card fraud, the responsibility still mainly falls into the hands of the employee working the checkout. And that is definitely not the most effective form of security.
How does Apple Pay’s security offer businesses protection?
Consumers receive a lot of protection from Apple Pay’s security. But this also equals more protection for businesses when it comes to credit card fraud. It is very difficult, if not impossible, for somebody to use someone elses credit card information to purchase something using Apple Pay. Apple has a lot of security precautions in place if someone was to lose their iPhone or their Apple Watch. Both require security codes to use Apple Pay and an iPhone even requires Touchid to be enabled. And even if someone was to get ahold of an iPhone and bypass these, the phone owner can manually delete everything from Apple Pay using Find My iPhone. This is what makes nearly impossible for someone to perform credit card fraud using Apple Pay.
What if a hacker manages to get through Apple Pay’s security and get my information?
The other way criminals perform credit card fraud is by obtaining credit card information from someone and using it to either make a new card or order things from online stores. But once again, this is also very protected against within Apple Pay’s security. First, Apple uses tokenization to encrypt all credit card information stored within Apple Pay. When using Apple Pay, consumers send a Device Account Number along with a Dynamic Security code to the merchant and then bank approves the transaction. Neither Apple nor the Merchant ever receive the information. This makes it very difficult for hackers to steal information when consumers use Apple Pay.
But what if a hacker actually does manage to get information from Apple Pay? Don’t worry, your business will still be protected, Apple has this covered too. Each device has a Secure Element that stores the Device Account Number, because this number is unique and different from credit and debit card numbers, the bank can prevent its use on a magnetic strip card, over the phone, or on websites. This is what makes Apple Pay’s security so outstanding, even if somebody managed to get an iPhone and get information from it, they still can’t do anything with it.
Key takeaway for Apple Pay’s security
It is clearly in a business’s best interest to accept Apple Pay. It provides many security precautions that helps prevent credit card fraud. This doesn’t only help the consumer, it helps businesses too. In 2014, Merchants incurred huge costs in addition to their fraud losses with each dollar of fraud costing them $3.08. Apple Pay’s security can help your business save loads of money by preventing fraud both online and in-store. For more information about Apple Pay’s Security from a consumers point of view, check out Is Apple Pay secure in store, online, and in your pocket?
