Simply put, PCI compliance means that as a business, you are properly and securely managing your customer credit card information, sensitive data, credit card transactions and your business environment.

The goal of PCI is to ensure that people who want to conduct business with merchants using their credit cards can do so with confidence and trust because they know that the merchant is compliant with all of the Payment Card Industry (PCI) standards. By doing so, both the consumer and the merchant can continue using recognized Payment Brand credit cards (Visa, MC, Amex, Discover) as the safest, simplest and most trusted means of payment exchange.

PCI compliance is outlined by the Payment Card Industry (PCI) Council and the standards for compliance are established by them as well. The primary role of the PCI Council is to advise businesses about what the credit card companies or Payment Brands expect from merchants that transact day-to-day business with their customers using credit cards as a means of payment. As a result, the PCI Council has established a set of credit card payment and security standards to help businesses minimize data breaches and credit card security problems and to provide assurance to their financial service providers that they are PCI compliant as a business.

Complying with the PCI Council standards requires the completion of a Self Assessment Questionnaire (SAQ). This SAQ contains questions that require a business owner to know information about how their business operates, handles IT connectivity, completes credit card transactions and stores critical information. Completing the SAQ can be a daunting task for business owners or managers that are not information security professionals. The critical issue in completing the SAQ is the accuracy of the answers to the questions. Getting professional security consultant assistance with the SAQ can be very costly for a small business. As a result, Panoptic Security has developed an online application that provides the expert direction and help needed to guide a small business owner or manager through the PCI SAQ.

Panoptic Security and our online PCI compliance solution, ExpertPCI™ helps businesses in assessing whether or not they are PCI compliant and advise on what to do to become PCI compliant. We can provide support for all size and type of businesses, but our online web application was designed by our PCI security experts to make the PCI compliance process easier specifically for small to mid-size business owners.