Using Credit/Debit Card Dynamic Soft Descriptor as Fraud Prevention System for Merchant

This paper presents a novel method of using Dynamic Soft Descriptor as a fraud prevention method for Merchant (as opposed to card Issuer) in a credit/debit card transaction under Card Not Present (CNP) environment, such as online transactions. A unique identifier is embedded into the transaction descriptor, which will instantly appear in the cardholder’s credit/debit card online statement. By checking his online statement, or calling his credit/debit card bank, a cardholder can obtain this identifier; and then provides the Merchant with this identifier as a proof of access to the statement. As the identifier is propagated using card association’s back-end system and as only legitimate cardholder can access the card’s statement, it is very unlikely that a fraudster can obtain this identifier information. Unlike other fraud prevention proposals, this proposed method is readily available and can be used right now by Merchant without the need for explicit support from card Issuer. Furthermore, it can be used starting with the very first transaction. So, it is more attractive than ordinary fraud detection method that requires significant amount of transactions. It can be readily deployed under the current card processing infrastructure, and we will show real life result at an e-commerce Merchant. Keywords—Electronic Commerce; credit card fraud; Card Not Present; dynamic soft descriptor; fraud prevention; chargeback