The Reserve Bank of India has recently announced a new set of guidelines security and risk measures that banks need to take for electronic payment transactions. Some key changes: - International use of debit and credit cards: A key change being made is the provision that credit and debit cards should be issued only for domestic use by default, and if a customer needs a credit/debit card for international use they will have to specifically apply for the card for international transactions. The deadline for this is June 30th 2013. Implications: one doesn't know how banks will implement this, but ideally, card users should apply to allow usage of debit cards internationally. There could be situations where a card, by default, is for domestic transactions only, but because app stores like that of Apple (iStore) or Google (Google Play) route payment through international payment gateways, their cards might not be accepted for international payments. A similar situation for buying advertising on Google or Facebook. This is not quite the solution we had in mind when we had asked for a level playing field for online transactions. - Second Factor Authentication for International transactions: Banks should move towards a system that facilitates implementation of additional factor of authentication for cards issued in India and used internationally (transactions acquired by banks located abroad). No deadline has been set for this, and this is probably because it is not clear how banks will force international payment gateways for implement a second factor of authentication. This is…
