Configuring Smart Authorization

A fraudulent customer can easily steal a credit card number and use it to place orders at your store. For this reason, when you sell items online, by telephone, or by mail, you need to take precautions to avoid fraud attempts. According to card association rules and even if the cardholder’s bank authorized the transaction, you are liable for losses if customers claim that their cards were used without their knowledge or consent. If this happens, you will be subject to a reversal of payment, also known as a chargeback.

With Smart Authorization and Advanced Smart Authorization, basic fraud detection tools, you can quickly and accurately identify fraudulent orders while minimizing the rejection of valid orders. Smart Authorization returns risk factor codes, which identify the conditions that contribute to a high risk result. You can use these factor codes to identify the reasons for the high risk result and, if justified, to attempt to convert the order to a sale. You decide whether to process the order regardless of the results of Smart Authorization or choose to review the order before you process it further. The figure below shows a sample Smart Authorization settings page. The online help explains how to set the tests that you want CyberSource to run for each of your transactions.

Because CyberSource uses the order data to evaluate the level of risk, you should assess the customer’s input before you submit the data to CyberSource to ensure that the data is accurate. If you detect a problem, such as an typographical error, ask your customer to correct the data.

Rejection by the Smart Authorization tools is a soft reject as opposed to hard reject, which is due to causes other than Smart Authorization, such as invalid data, invalid card, or a system error:

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Soft rejection: If an order is rejected because it appears to be risky, you should review the order to verify that it is legitimate so that you can capture the authorization and fulfill the order. For more information on reviewing orders, see Reviewing Declined Credit Card Authorizations.

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Hard rejection: You cannot capture these orders.

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If you use Smart Authorization with card-present transactions, see Card Present: Retail.

Address Verification Service (AVS)


	Note if you do not use Smart Authorization: The Address Verification Service always screens orders even if you do not use Smart Authorization. If you request a sale (authorization and capture) for an order that receives a no address match result, the order will be processed successfully, and you will not be notified of the address verification results. Therefore, CyberSource recommends that you request only an authorization, which allows you to review the authorization results before capturing the order.

Although the Address Verification Service (AVS) runs automatically for every credit card authorization, AVS data is ignored when no address is submitted for card-present (retail) transactions processed in the Virtual Terminal.

The service compares the customer-provided billing address with the address on file at the issuing bank. A mismatch between these addresses may indicate fraud. Basic Smart Authorization interprets the results of the Address Verification Service. You can use its settings to decline transactions with any or all of these address verification results:

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Partial address match. Either the street address or the postal code matches.

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No address match. Neither the street address nor the postal code matches.

If you do not use the Smart Authorization settings for the address verification tests, and you request a sale (authorization and capture), your orders will be processed regardless of the address verification results, and you will not be notified of the address verification results.

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Service not available. The Address Verification Service is not working or is not supported.

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Card issued outside of the United States.

Card Verification Number

The card verification number (CVN) is a three- or four-digit number printed on most credit cards helps to prove that the customer has physical possession of the card, and that the card is valid. The table below gives the details for the cards accepted in the Virtual Terminal.


Visa	Card Verification Value (CVV2)	Back of card: if present, 3 digits in the signature area to the right of the card number.
MasterCard	Card Verification Code (CVC2)	Back of card: if present, 3 digits in the signature area to the right of the card number.
American Express	Card Identification Number (CID)	Front of card: 4 digits on the right above the card number.
Discover	Card Identification Number (CID)	Back of card: if present, 3 digits in the signature area to the right of the card number.
Diners Club	Card Verification Value (CVV)	Back of card: 3 digits in the signature area.
JCB	Card Verification Number (CVN)	Front of card: 4 digits on the left below the card number.