The American Bankers Association's Card Policy Council used the occasion of National Consumer Protection Week last week to call for all consumer-facing industries to implement the latest payment protection technologies and data safeguarding practices. 

"Consumers deserve strong, consistent safeguards to stop the loss of private information to criminals," said Jess Sharp, executive director of the ABA Card Policy Council. "As retailers store increasingly sensitive consumer data, they should be held to the same standards as credit card issuers."

An ABA press release referred to innovative technologies that include:

• issuing EMV chip cards;
• deploying technologies such as tokenization, biometrics, and encryption;
• providing round-the-clock fraud protection using advanced neural networks to monitor transactions and detect unusual activity; and
• protecting customers with zero-liability and purchase protections.

According to the release, policymakers can ensure that consumers are protected by enacting sensible guidelines. The council referred to "an urgently important piece of legislation, the Data Security Act," whose intent is to ensure that all entities that handle sensitive consumer financial information (including merchants) have robust data security safeguards in place.

"We remain eager to further engage other sectors in this important mission," Sharp said.