Whether you are an e-commerce veteran or startup entrepreneur, you may be familiar with 3D secure processing — an additional layer of fraud protection provided by certain banks.
3D secure goes beyond simply requiring credit card and customer information by adding a password to the credit card for online payment processing. Only the cardholder and the issuing bank know the password created by the cardholder. This protects the merchant from chargebacks caused by fraudulent transactions and helps consumers to feel secure knowing that they have more control over the use of their card. Here, we will lay out some of the details as to how and why this works.
The Three Domains
The term “3D” refers to the three domains involved in the transaction process:
- The acquiring bank’s domain
- The issuing bank’s domain
- The interoperability domain provided by the credit card association (e.g. Visa, MasterCard)
The interoperability domain is the middleman between the banks. It allows the acquiring bank to request and receive 3D secure validation from the issuing bank, and it acts as a translator between the two banks.
How Does 3D Secure Processing Work?
Let’s assume that you are an e-commerce merchant. Your acquiring bank supports 3D secure processing and you’ve already integrated it into your website. What happens when a customer submits a transaction? Once the payment gateway receives all of the transaction details (the acquiring bank’s domain), the payment gateway must verify the customer’s enrollment in 3D secure.
While it sounds time-consuming, it usually takes less than a second for the payment gateway to receive a response from the issuing bank via the interoperability domain. Depending on what type of card your customer is using, they will go to one of two pages — the Verified by Visa page or the MasterCard SecureCode page that their issuing bank hosts (the issuing bank’s domain).
The cardholder enters their password on the Verified by Visa or MasterCard SecureCode page, as well as any other required information. Based on the validation results, the customer will return to the payment gateway’s transaction process.
3D Secure Merchant Account Integration
3D secure has become more efficient and customer-friendly since its first iteration, and will continue to do so.
While it sounds complicated, the integration process for a 3D Secure merchant account is just as simple as with any other type of account. Once the payment gateway has the transaction details, your website or web application will behave the same as it would for any other transaction.
However, there is one difference. Processing time may take a bit longer as humans are generally a bit slower than computers. If your system normally stops a transaction when it doesn’t hear a response within a certain amount of time, you may want to adjust or remove the timeout feature.
Don’t Leave Your Customers Wondering
Are you concerned that your customers will not understand why they’re being redirected to another page? It might be a good idea to let them know ahead of time that you use 3D Secure processing, and link to a reputable site that explains the process for customers. In the end, it makes customers feel just as secure as merchants by decreasing the number of places where their information is exposed.
3D Secure validation is both valuable and simple for a merchant. The level of fraud protection it provides may very well increase the trust your customers have with you. If using a bank-hosted payment page, a customer can trust that their financial institutions are the only agents with all of their credit card data, and only their issuing bank has the password to use it. While the payment process is slightly more complex, a little education goes a long way.
3D Secure Merchant Accounts with Instabill
Instabill works with acquiring banks that can integrate your merchant account with 3D Secure payment processing. Not tech-savvy? Our expert tech team is here to help you with any problems you may have with the payment gateway integration. For merchants who want a 3D secure merchant account, be sure to specifically ask for one when talking with your merchant account manager.
For more information on how you can apply for a 3D Secure merchant account with Instabill, contact us online today or call us toll-free at 1-800-318-2713.
