Revised Reserve Bank guidelines irk e-tailers

New Delhi: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) might revise its guidelines on the data storage policy, in a bid to discourage ecommerce portal from retaining the transaction card details of the online customers on their servers' databases.

This would mean that the aggregators would be prevented from storing valued transaction data and a customer would be required to punch in card details such as 16-digit card number; its expiry date, CVV number each time a customer makes an online transaction.

According to the RBI, the stringent measure would prevent any additional risk of fraud and financial theft, thereby keeping a check on third-party payments.

As per media reports, earlier this year, a group of 25 consumer internet companies including Flipkart, Amazon, Netflix, Microsoft and Zomato wrote to RBI on the matter saying that such a move would discourage customers from enjoying hassle-free payment experience, and may also hamper fraud risk assessment.

Incase, the RBI chooses to revises the guidelines from January next year, then the customers holding debit or credit card would be required to punch in their 16-digit card number for each online transaction.

The guidelines, once approved, will be applicable on all online payment platforms whether the payment is being done on a merchant website, such as Google Pay to PayTM, or via e-commerce platform, like Amazon or Flipkart.