News

Postilion drives Africa's migration to EMV chip and PIN

April 19, 2009

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Postilion, a division of S1 Corp., is assisting its African banking and retail clients in updating their technology during the continent-wide migration from magnetic-stripe cards to chip cards.

In South Africa, credit card fraud reached R420 million in 2008, a 146 percent increase from the previous year, according to the South African Banking Risk Information Centre. Growth in fraudulent transactions is the primary driver for the migration.

EMV chip and PIN technology is more secure, because data stored on the chip cannot generally be duplicated. Using a PIN in all instances, rather than a signature, adds further to transaction security, Postilion says, thereby lowering instances of card fraud. EMV technology is being implemented globally, requiring that new cards be issued and both ATM networks and retail point of sale acceptance infrastructure be upgraded.

In sub-Saharan Africa's two largest economies, South Africa and Nigeria, the migration to EMV chip and PIN technology is moving ahead at an increasing pace. The Central Bank of Nigeria has ordered banks to stop issuing mag-stripe cards from April 1, 2009, on. With 23 of the 24 banks in Nigeria and the central payments switch all using Postilion software, Postilion says it is playing a crucial role in migrating the card programs and acceptance infrastructure of these institutions to chip and PIN technology.

In South Africa, the first million bank cards have been successfully migrated to international chip and PIN standards. Although this is only a fraction of the country's total card base, the momentum to change is evident. The continent's three largest banks, all based in South Africa, are Postilion users. To coincide with EMV card issuance, banks have been upgrading their ATM estates and South Africa's major retailers have also been turning to Postilion to assist them in becoming EMV compliant.