3-D Secure (i.e. Verified by Visa and Mastercard SecureCode) is a cardholder authentication method designed to provide more security and shift the liability of fraudulent payments away from the merchants.

Unfortunately along with the extra security comes very cumbersome extra steps for the customers. The reduced user experience often leads to shopping cart abandonment or even permanent loss of customers to more agile competitors. The impact on sales is even greater when purchases are made via mobile devices.

How to minimize risk while preserving fluent service?

One solution is dynamic 3-D secure. With Payment Highway, the merchants can decide when to demand stronger authentication per transaction basis. Alternatively pre-configured rules may be used. The rules can be based but are not limited to the value of the transaction, card issuing country or cardholder's physical location.

For low value purchases, digital content or if the user is already securely authenticated to the service, it might be an overkill to demand those inconvenient extra authentication steps.

Many online services have even abandoned the usage of 3-D secure altogether, as the value of lost customers tends to be much greater than the possible costs of fraud. When using Payment Highway's dynamic 3-D secure it is easy to A/B test and weigh different scenarios and end up with the best possible risk to profit ratio.

Merchants can also choose to use 3-D secure when a new customer stores their payment card information for the first time. The one-click, no-click or subscription based payments can then later be securely used by a verified user. Easy, yet secure!

Conversion and security via digital wallets

Digital Wallets such as Mastercard's Masterpass and Danske Bank's MobilePay provide another easy, yet secure way for merchants to accept payments online. Customers can easily select their credit card and confirm the payment via a mobile device. These payment methods are typically considered extremely secure and no extra verification steps need to be taken. Digital wallets can improve both conversion and security tremendously!

Payment Highway strives to always provide the latest and the best payment methods available to merchants! Are you interested in providing better user experience for your customers and improve conversion? Don't hesitate to contact us.