Pine Labs launches 'Plural Tokenizer' to help firms with RBI norms

Service announced in line with central bank's new data security guidelines coming into effect from January 1

Pine Labs, an online merchant commerce platform, has launched a tokenisation solution that works across leading card networks, announcing the service in line with new data security guidelines by India’s central bank coming into effect from January 1.

‘Plural Tokenizer’ Card-on-File or CoF tokenisation solution will replace the debit or credit card details of a cardholder with what are called ‘tokens’ or randomly generated numbers. It uses OTP-based two-factor Authentication, ensuring cryptograms unique to each transaction and issuance of tokens to merchants for a particular use case that cannot be used outside that specific merchant (CoF) use case or domain (F2F) use case.

The service should be handy as the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) guidelines mandate no entity other than the card issuer or card networks to store actual cardholder data with effect from January 1, 2022.

“The launch of Plural Tokenizer is our endeavour to make the payment transaction experience more secure for the end-user i.e., our merchant’s customers. Plural is today the only omnichannel platform in India to manage tokens across offline and online payment experiences,” said Tanya Naik – Head of Online Business at Pine Labs.

'Plural' is Pine Labs’ recent foray into the online payments space. Products under brand Plural offer an integrated omnichannel payment experience for brands across offline and online platforms, offering multiple payment choices and Buy Now Pay Later integration to customers. Several integration options are available under Plural Tokenizer for merchants to enable a seamless and secure payment experience to their customers.

Plural Tokenizer is another major data security-focused launch at Pine Labs. In January 2021, Pine Labs had launched AllTap, a robust PCI SSC compliant Contactless Payments on COTS (CPoC) solution that underwent an extensive audit and certification from PCI SSC and leading networks like Amex, Mastercard, RuPay, and Visa.

Mastercard and Google have rolled out tokenization that will enable Google Pay users to safely transact using their Mastercard credit and debit cards. Through tokenization, Mastercard cardholders can make payments through a secure digital token without having to share their credit or debit card details such as card number, expiry date, etc. with a merchant. This collaboration is a commitment to ensure the best-in-class user experience and security features in an increasingly digital-first world.

With this collaboration, Google Pay Android users can scan and pay across all Bharat QR-enabled merchants, tap-and-pay, and make in-app transactions through their Mastercard debit and credit card. For a convenient registration, users will do a one-time setup by entering their card details and their OTP to add their card on the Google Pay app.

“We are excited to collaborate with Mastercard for card tokenization which will offer users state-of-the-art security for card payments,” said Sajith Sivanandan, Business Head, Google Pay and NBU-APAC. “This is already live for several credit card issuers on Mastercard, and we are working closely with other banking partners to further expand the adoption of tokenization in India.”

Cashfree Payments, a payments and API banking solutions company, has said that its tokenization solution ‘Token Vault’ will go live on December 27. The company is working with Visa and Mastercard to deploy tokenization services for its customers.

‘Token Vault’ will eliminate a merchant’s need to onboard multiple payment partners by enabling them to save tokenized cards and process payments using tokenized cards, acting as a single solution. Merchants will now be able to leverage increased security, cost-saving, digitalised experience and simplified data storage.

“With this offering, customers will be empowered with a secure and compliance-friendly payments inflow system,” said Akash Sinha, CEO and co-Founder, Cashfree Payments. “This is a further step towards enhancing the security of card transactions. The end customer will feel more confident about their data security and further cement their trust in digital shopping experience.”