VeriSign announced the launch of a new Fraud Protection Services program suite June 18, aimed at cutting e-commerce chargebacks and buyer fraud by a linkage between computer locations and credit timing information. It's aimed at helping e-tailers make stronger verification of buyers and cutting back on chargebacks.
"Security and fraud on the Internet are critical issues facing retailers," said VeriSign senior vice president for electronic commerce Stephen W. Orfei as the company announced the new services suite. "They increase the costs associated with chargebacks while damaging consumer confidence. (This) fraud solution program provides a very real response to these issues by allowing merchants to use fraud protection services, including buyer authentication payment card programs…ultimately protecting both retailers and their customers and increasing consumer confidence."
One skeptic is Electronic Frontier Foundation technologist Dan Moniz, who said the risks include making anonymous transactions harder and forcing those who prefer to buy anonymously "to subscribe to a special service and pay extra."
And the VeriSign announcement comes while the company continues awaiting whether the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will return a complaint for accoutability from Sex.com owner Gary Kremen to the lower federal courts.
Kremen accuses VeriSign, known then as Network Solutions, Inc., of laxity in verification when Stephen Cohen hijacked the domain from him in 1995. Kremen subsequently won back the domain and won a $65 million judgment against Cohen, whose whereabouts remain unknown even after his final appeal to avoid the judgment was spurned by the U.S. Supreme Court last week.
But the company's new Fraud Protection Services suite includes among its customers the Dallas Cowboys Pro Shops and Webstore, Loews Cineplex theatres, sportswear and equipment retailer Anaconda Sports, and semiconductor manufacturer-seller Initio Corporation.
"The Internet has made it very easy for today's companies to begin transacting online, but companies that want to grow and become retail leaders have to realize that guarding against fraud is a full-time job," said Jeff Coleman, who runs merchandising for the Cowboys Pro Shops, astride the VeriSign announcement. "VeriSign's fraud monitoring solutions can help businesses like ours focus on selling and serving our customers knowing that our transaction processes are more secure."
The FPS suite includes account security and monitoring services and a feature called Allowed IPs. VeriSign says that feature lets the merchant specify Internet protocol addresses acceptable as account access sources, "ensur(ing) that no one can log in from an unauthorized computer." Another feature, Payflow Pro, lets merchant users restrict transactions to specifically authorized computers.
