SECURE PAYMENT AGENT (SPA)

Recently The ITRC published a White Paper that developed the parameters that defines a new emerging product class they designated as “Secure Payment Agents” or “SPAs”. This widely published White Paper from perhaps the world’s most prestigious identity theft protection organization established a much needed standard against which both consumers and businesses can evaluate the myriad of products and services claiming to protect against and prevent identity theft. The following is an excerpt from the ITRC White Paper:

Excerpt from ITRC Secure Payment Agent White Paper

Recently we have become aware of a new product class that is emerging on the Internet, where consumers consistently give up a great deal of their personal information when transacting online or registering at websites.  This new product class is substantially different and much broader in the scope of protection offered versus previous products, all of which have only attacked parts of the problem.  We have designated this emerging class of products “Secure Payment Agents”.

A “Secure Payment Agent” as defined by ITRC allows the consumer to control the use of all their sensitive personal information whether shopping, paying bills online, or registering at websites.  A Secure Payment Agent has the ability to replace all of the user’s real personal information with anonymous data that becomes useless after a transaction and cannot be traced back to the user.

The following are the performance requirements the ITRC has established for a product to qualify as a Secure Payment Agent:

  • Replaces the consumer’s real personal identifying and financial information with anonymous data that is untraceable back to the consumer
  • Eliminates phishing both when visiting websites and receiving incoming email
  • Verifies both consumer and device before allowing access to or use of the Secure Payment Agent
  • Stores user data so it becomes useless if the Secure Payment Agent’s data base storage system is breached
  • Merchants must be able to send, and consumers to receive, purchase/shipment confirmations without delay, extra steps or the use of supplemental devices.
  • Authentication method must be “Multi-Authentication” using attributes of:
    • Who You Are
    • What You Have
    • What You Know

We are pleased to the able to state that, to the best our knowledge Shop Shield represents the very first product to meet ALL of the ITRC’s prerequisites for being a Secure Payment Agent. By so doing, it significantly exceeds the performance of competitive products claiming identity theft protection benefits.