Glossary

Paper Draft

Sales slips, credit slips, cash disbursement slips, drafts, vouchers, and other obligations indicating use of a card or a card account.

Password

A sequence of characters which allows users access to a system. Although they are supposed to be unique, experience has shown that most people’s choices are highly insecure. Humans tend to choose short words such as names, which are easy to guess.

Payment Service Provider (PSP)

A company that specializes in the provision of payment services for merchant on the Internet. The PSP will handle the capture, authorisation and settlement of Credit and debit card payments and all the electronic and physical security required. They will often provide additional services such as fraud detection and prevention.

PCI Security Standards Council

Is an open global forum, launched in 2006, that is responsible for the development, management, education, and awareness of the PCI Security Standards, including the Data Security Standard (PCI DSS), Payment Application Data Security Standard (PA-DSS), and PIN Transaction Security (PTS) requirements.

Per Transaction Fees

Fees paid by the merchant to the merchant bank or other contracted party on a per transaction basis.

PIN (Personal Identification Number)

A sequence of digits used to verify the identity of the holder of a token.

PKI

Public Key Infrastructure -the total system used in verifying, enrolling and certifying users of a security application.

Plastic

This is a generic term used to identify any of the various cards issued to cardholders. Take a look at the supported cards at Cardstream Secure Paymeny Gateway.

Point Of Sale (POS)

Location in a merchant establishment at which the sale is consummated by payment for goods or services received.

Policy

An informal, generally natural language description of desired system behavior. Policies may be defined for particular requirements, such as confidentiality, integrity, availability, safety, etc.

POS System

A system that processes commercial transactions such as an credit card terminal, electronic cash register, or specialized software.

Posting

The process of updating individual cardholder account balances to reflect merchandise sales, instant cash, cash advances, adjustments, payments, and any other charges or credits.

Presentment

A clearing record that an acquirer presents to an issuer through interchange, either initially or after a chargeback.

Primary Account Number (PAN)

The number that is embossed, encoded, or both, on a plastic card that identifies the issuer and the particular cardholder account.

Prior Authorisation

An authorisation usually done before a transaction takes place. The approved authorisation request may be held for an extended length of time before a card is present or not.

Private Key

A cryptographic key known only to the user, employed in public key cryptography in decrypting or signing information.

Processing Date

The date on which the transaction is processed by the acquiring bank.

Public Key

A cryptographic key which is used for data encryption and which cannot be used for decryption. Public keys can be freely published.

Public Key Cryptography

A form of asymmetric encryption where all parties possess a pair of keys, one private and one public, for use in encryption and digital signing of data.