Visa in no hurry to rush SET tests
By Jim Kerstetter
Visa International Inc. and MasterCard
International
Inc., although partnered for the sake of an
encryption
specification, have vastly different views
of where that
technology stands.
A Visa USA official in Foster City, Calif.,
this week
downplayed the near-completion of the SET
(Secure
Electronic Transaction) specification for
commerce on
the Internet that MasterCard officials
enthusiastically
discussed last week.
In fact, Visa is striking a tone that's as
conservative as
MasterCard's is aggressive, advising
consumers to
avoid using their credit cards on the
Internet until the
SET specification is completed and a
certification
process for SET-enabled software is
established.
"We believe that the card holder and the
merchant have
the best opportunity for a secure
transaction with a full
SET environment," said Stephanie
Keller-Bottom, vice
president of electronic commerce for Visa
USA. "We
don't think that's there yet."
That's not to say Visa isn't involved in
SET testing of its
own, and Keller-Bottom said Visa wants to
see the
spec finished as soon as possible. She
cautioned,
however, that rushing SET to consumers
could produce
mistakes that ultimately slow the
development of
Internet commerce.
Keller-Bottom said Visa is running
compatibility tests of
SET-enabled applications in an internal
laboratory.
Several interoperability tests with some of
Visa's
member banks are also planned for the near
future,
although Keller-Bottom would not name them.
Unlike MasterCard, which is relying on
third parties
such as the Open Group for interoperability
testing,
Visa will manage its interoperability
projects, she said.
Visa also is looking for ways to pre-load
certificates
into a SET transaction.
There's no rush to SET standardization,
Keller-Bottom
said, and there's no need to commit to a
timeline for
interoperability testing.
"When we know our time frames, we will be
communicating them to all the parties," she
said.
Last week, MasterCard officials said they
expect to
begin interoperability testing of competing
SET
products by the end of the month. They also
expect a
final version of SET to be printed by June.