Most people probably hear the words ‘PCI compliance’ and start to zone out a little (or a lot), but try not to this time.
There are some changes being made to the PCI compliance standards to close a worldwide security hole, and many of our customers need to take action as soon as possible.
What does PCI compliance really mean? PCI compliance standards define how businesses need to protect the customer information that’s processed at their store. Due to tighter restrictions, older web browsers that your customers might be using can allow your ecommerce servers to be breached.
The PCI Security Standards Council released an update to the latest version of the PCI compliance standards that went into effect at the beginning of the year. The update comes from a push to ensure more secure encryption protocols and reduce weaknesses in website security.
In order to provide the highest level of security for sites hosted at CQL, we will be making changes to stay ahead of new PCI compliance and secure web traffic requirements. After June 30, 2016, sellers will no longer be allowed to use SSL or TLS to protect payment data. To prepare for this change, we’re working hard to ensure that our clients and servers are updated before this date.
Because this update will rely on more modern security protocols, not all web browsers will be compatible with the changes and outdated browsers will need to be upgraded.
What does this mean for you? Well, essentially, any users with the following browsers will no longer be able to access your site without first updating or switching browsers.
Browsers Affected:
- IE 10 and below
- Safari 6.1.6 and below
- FireFox 26 and below
- Android 4 and below
For organizations with a significant user base (5% or more) still accessing the site with an affected browser, we recommend adding browser detection, a technique that determines which browser a web visitor is using, to your site as soon as possible. We also suggest providing these users with a friendly message encouraging them to upgrade to a supported browser.
If you’d like to know more about how this update will affect your users and how to avoid potential problems, CQL is happy to work with you. Please reach out to us for help with the above recommendations to ensure the smoothest transition for all of your users. You can also test the sites you use frequently to see if they have already addressed this problem.
