Vantiv Extends Initiative To Drive Payment Security

Vantiv Integrated Payments, a Vantiv company, announced Thursday (Feb. 18) the launch of the next phase of its Security Pays initiative. The Security Pays 2.0 release is aimed at driving an increased adoption of security products, while also promoting education and awareness of the methods used to safeguard the payment process, such as EMV, tokenization and end-to-end encryption.

“In the first Security Pays campaign, we deployed more than 10,000 EMV devices to businesses,” Matt Taylor, group president of integrated payments and emerging channels at Vantiv, said in a press release. “But we realized that is just the tip of the iceberg. That’s why we are launching Security Pays 2.0 to reach even more partners and merchants to continue the adoption of EMV, point-to-point encryption and tokenization technologies at the point of sale and make the payments ecosystem safer, better educated and more successful.”

The first phase of the Security Pays initiative was announced in 2015 by Vantiv Integrated Payments, formerly Mercury Payment Systems, and serves as a way for the firm to advocate for new security standards and protocols within the payments space.

The program featured opportunities for developers to integrate security software with the company’s eponymous payments platform, incentivizing efforts towards a focus on stronger security practices, security certification and training.

Last year, Security Pays gained more than 10,000 Vantiv Integrated Payments partner interactions just five months into the campaign; the company confirmed that the program had approximately 1,000 partner participants. Since its initial launch, Security Pays has provided the opportunity for 67 Vantiv partners to achieve Qualified Integrators and Resellers (QIR) certification.

“Vantiv Integrated Payments is doing something that no other company is doing in the payments industry,” Thad Peterson, senior analyst at Aite Group, explained. “Vantiv is focusing not only on education but on implementation at the merchant level to promote secure behaviors and products. You can already see the change based on Security Pays 2015.”

Vantiv said Security Pays 2.0 will dive even deeper into building engagement and activation surrounding security standards with merchants.

“We want our partners to integrate security into the sales dialogue and promote to the businesses the responsibility and advantages of implementing these products,” Vantiv’s SVP of the integrated payments channel, Matt Downs, added. “This new program will also focus on helping partners and merchants with additional awareness on industry changes and subsidies on products and hardware that will make such a difference in their security to ensure integrity of the payments system.”