Tips for New Entrepreneurs

Point of Sale systems, or POS systems, are one of the more popular machines for hackers to try to attack due to the fact that they contain sensitive financial information. However, it is relatively easy to protect your POS systems and take reasonable precautions in order to keep your customers' data safe. Here are some steps that you can take in order to protect your POS systems.

1. Buy the Right Devices

There is a group called the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council that does a great deal of testing in order to make sure that they can have a list of POS system devices that are relatively safe to use and are secure from most conventional attacks. You want to buy products that have been approved by this council. This is absolutely critical because it will allow you to make sure that you have the most secure POS system tools on the market, as well as ensure that you are in compliance with PCI Security Standards Council guidelines.

2. Limit Internet Use

If your POS system devices are able to access the Internet and employees need to access the Internet on a regular basis in order to do their jobs, you need to make sure that you closely monitor and limit Internet access. There's a good chance that your employees are only using a handful of sites in order to get the information that they need to do their jobs. You can therefore block all other sites from being accessed and simply whitelist the sites that your employees require. This will limit the chances that attackers have to get at you POS system through the Internet and will greatly improve security. You also want to block any website that will allow you to download attachments, such as email sites and social media sites. You don't want to risk having an employee inadvertently download a virus that exposes your customers' private financial information.

3. Consider Chip POS Systems

Finally, consider upgrading your POS systems so that they are able to accept cards with chips and process them in a more secure manner. This allows you to completely bypass scanning many cards and having to worry about an RFID scanner being present to steal your customers' information. Having chip POS systems can make your entire system safer.

For more information, talk to a company that specializes in POS systems, like Schmaus Cash Register Company. They will be able to help you put further safeguards in place to make sure that your customers' credit card information remains safe.