Verified by VISA is a card security verification that is used on registered VISA cards when they have a transaction on the Internet. The benefit is open to all VISA debit cards, although the user has to be registered on the site.

The system works by having a pre-set password.  Like a pin number the password should be kept secret and it should not be a password that is used on most other applications.  VISA enforces best practice with passwords by forcing the user to use numbers in the password as well as having upper and lower case letters.

There is also a prompt on the screen.  The prompt will be pre-set by the card user at the same time that the password is chosen and it may, or may not, relate to the password.  The prompt should not obviously lead to the password if a well-informed stranger were to get hold of the card.

The Verified by VISA screen appears when the card details have been entered on to an internet commerce shopping card when the user is attempting to buy a good or service.  If the shopping card and the merchant are compliant with the Verified by VISA standards, and the largest ones are, then there will be a screen that appears with the issuing bank’s logo and the Verified by VISA data entry screen.  Although the screen is an extra step in the process the user only needs to enter their password to get to the final stage.

The Verified by VISA scheme deals with one of the big issues with chip and pin in that it can’t deal with internet transactions.  Chip and pin is the security measure that has been introduced to ensure that by 2015 all debit card purchases made at shops will need to be verified by a pin number and the card.  This double check has reduced fraud in other countries that have adopted this system by as much as 80%.  Verified by VISA, by adding in the extra verification step, has a similar rate of success at cutting down credit card fraud over the internet.

VISA is the largest credit card company in the world.  It is accepted in 29 million outlets and is popular with debit card providers because of its wide acceptance both in Australia and abroad.  As part of its services as a provider it offers a zero liability guarantee, where a card holder who suffers unauthorised transactions is not held liable for the transactions if they report them in a timely manner.  This zero liability policy means that card companies like VISA are keen to cut down fraud by as much as possible.