Visa targets online market

One of the world's top credit-card payment system operators is scheduled to roll out its online payment security service in Taiwan this September, an executive from Visa International said yesterday.

"The future e-commerce market in Taiwan is considerable, while the fear of online security stops consumers from shopping online," Bruce Mansfield, head of e-Visa Asia-Pacific, said.

"In an effort to eliminate that fear and then boost online transaction amounts, after launching our secure service late last year in the United States, Visa International decided to roll out that mechanism in Taiwan."

The local e-commerce sector is still in its infancy, Mansfield said.

In the US, the world's top e-commerce market, about 5 percent of Visa's transaction revenue comes from payments that are made online, while that figure is about 3 percent in Taiwan, he said.

The Ministry of Economic Affairs said that the domestic online shopping market has grown dramatically in recent years, generating sales totalling NT$9 billion last year. Sales are estimated to reach NT$37.8 billion by 2004.

"Without a question, e-commerce business is going to flourish ... [so] we invented the authentication platform, becoming the first credit-card system company to promote online commerce," Mansfield said.

With Visa's online secure service -- dubbed "Verified by Visa," shoppers are required to enter their credit-card numbers, expiration dates and private passwords to verify their identity when making online purchases. Verification is conducted using a separate window from the Visa card issuer, meaning no merchant ever has access to the cardholder's password.

Visa Taiwan said it has linked up with several banks to promote the service.

"The nation's top two credit-card issuers -- Chinatrust Commercial Bank (中國信託銀行) and Taishin International Bank (台新銀行) -- will start to offer "Verified by Visa" service in September," said Constance Lu (呂麗雯), a manager at Visa International Taiwan.

Chinatrust is teaming up with e-commerce sites, such as Giga Media (和信超媒體), Green-world.com, Yahoo-Kimo and Coolbid.com (酷必得), to offer the service. It hopes to attract 50,000 card holders to register with this service by year end. But Visa may have to be patient.

"Most people still don't regard e-commerce as an attractive shopping channel," Chen Chia-hsien (陳佳賢), an analyst at the Market Intelligent Center said.

Rival MasterCard International also has plans to begin a similar service by early next year.