PRINCETON JUNCTION, N.J., April 2, 2014 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- U.S. EMV chip adoption is poised for exponential growth in the next year from today's estimated 17 to 20 million EMV chip cards and millions of EMV-capable terminals and ATMs, some of which already accept EMV chip cards, the EMV Migration Forum announced at its March meeting. The Forum also provided in-depth briefings on the significant progress in working through technical challenges relating to EMV debit implementation, resulting in an industry stakeholder-supported debit technical solution framework.
"In the last few months we have seen a dramatic shift in the interest and understanding of the benefits that EMV chip cards provide, particularly in helping to lessen the impacts of payment data breaches and to prevent counterfeit card fraud. As a result, the U.S. migration is accelerating and there is a refreshed urgency in resolving issues and moving forward as quickly as possible," said Randy Vanderhoof, director, EMV Migration Forum. "Given the commitment and work of our membership and the recent progress in resolving debit challenges, I think in the next year we could see a hundred million or more chip cards issued and more than double the number of installed terminals."
Since its inception in 2012, the EMV Migration Forum has brought all industry stakeholders, including global payments brands, financial institutions, merchants, processors, acquirers, regional debit networks, industry associations and industry suppliers together to work collaboratively towards a successful migration. At the center of Forum's work are the EMV Migration Forum Working Committees, which continue to make progress through industry cooperation:
Debit Working Committee and Debit Technical Work Group: The Debit Technical Work Group has developed a technical framework for a U.S. EMV debit solution. The Forum has completed a thorough industry review of the framework that included merchants, issuers, regional debit networks, global payment brands and the ATM industry, with members agreeing that it addresses key challenges. The framework follows the EMV specification and was developed to address current debit routing regulatory requirements and potential future requirements that could call for at least two debit routing choices for each transaction.
While availability of this framework is meant to help move EMV debit implementations forward, adoption of it and specific technical solutions by individual industry stakeholders will ultimately depend on their own independent business decisions, considerations and circumstances. The Forum will be completing a white paper on the framework and anticipates publishing it to the industry in April.
ATM Working Committee: The Committee is providing input, solutions and expertise to the ATM channel as it migrates to EMV chip technology. The Committee is finalizing "Implementing EMV at the ATM," a comprehensive implementation and planning guide for ATM acquirers, processors and vendors for implementing EMV chip technology in the U.S. ATM infrastructure.
Testing and Certification Working Committee: The Committee is progressing in providing critical information on testing and certification requirements for all stakeholders depending on their role in the ecosystem. The Committee's white paper, "Current U.S. Payment Brand Requirements for the Acquiring Community," is available today for industry-wide use. The Committee is moving forward with an assessment of the current testing and certification processes to determine if processes can be streamlined.
Communication and Education Working Committee: The Committee is building a new online resource center for the essential education piece of EMV chip migration for industry participants. This Knowledge Center will serve as a one-stop resource for EMV migration-related documents. The Committee has published an updated Standardization of Terminology document as an industry resource for educational and marketing communications.
Card-Not-Present Fraud Working Committee: While card-present counterfeit fraud drops significantly, countries that have implemented EMV chip technology have reported a shift in fraud to card-not-present (CNP) channels. Utilizing best practices from other markets and analyzing today's online fraud tools, this Committee is creating a comprehensive best practices strategy white paper to mitigate against an increase in CNP fraud following U.S. EMV migration.
U.S. Coordination Working Committee: Having identified industry coordination of the results of early implementations of chip cards and terminals as integral to achieving a successful migration, this Committee continues to work on defining a potential "Phase One" project in a focused geography with the goal of generating efficient and consistent operations and messaging across the industry.
The Forum's March meeting was its most well-attended to date with more than 260 individuals from 152 members companies. The EMV Migration Forum's next two-day member conference will be held May 20-21 in San Diego. For more information, visit http://www.emv-connection.com/emv-migration-forum/next-meeting/.
About U.S. EMV Migration
Commonly used globally in place of magnetic stripe, EMV chip technology helps to reduce card fraud in a face-to-face card-present environment; provides global interoperability; and enables safer and smarter transactions across contact and contactless channels. EMV implementation was initiated in the U.S. market in 2011 and 2012 when American Express, Discover, MasterCard and Visa announced their roadmaps for supporting an EMV-based payments infrastructure. Acquirer processor readiness mandates to support EMV were established for 2013, with liability shifts for managing fraud risk in a face-to-face environment set for 2015.
About the EMV Migration Forum
The EMV Migration Forum is a cross-industry body focused on supporting the EMV implementation steps required for global and regional payment networks, issuers, processors, merchants, and consumers to help ensure a successful introduction of more secure EMV chip technology in the United States. The focus of the Forum is to address topics that require some level of industry cooperation and/or coordination to migrate successfully to EMV technology in the United States. For more information on the EMV Migration Forum, please visit http://www.emv-connection.com/emv-migration-forum/.