Earlier this month, the Trustwave 2013 Global Security Report was released, which concludes that, “The combination of business and IT transformation, compliance and governance demands and the onslaught of security threats continues to make the job of safeguarding data assets a serious challenge for organizations of all types—from multinational corporations to independent merchants to government entities.”  The report shows that in 2012 the following industries were forced to conduct the most data breach investigations:

·         Retail industry

·         Food & drink industry

·         Hospitality industry

The report further shows that basic security measures are still not in place at many global companies.  The report uses as an example, the level of password security among company employees, who are implementing only the bare minimum of security.  The report notes that “Password1” is the most common password used among global businesses, making it easy for hackers to gain entry into their systems.

 As evidenced by this report, the hospitality industry is a common target for cybercrime.  PCI compliance for hoteliers will be crucial to protect customers’ payment card security.  A PCI compliance program, however, must go beyond global policies and reach individual employees.  PCI training can enhance a company’s overall level of PCI compliance beyond the bare minimum of security.  Among the most effective PCI training programs for hotels are those that include custom learning solutions, such as PCI compliance training modules and similar training on best practices for using hospitality technology.

The Venza Group has partnered with Arnall Golden Gregory (AGG) to create a series of interactive eLearning modules to address PCI compliance in the hotel industry. Management, employees and IT are taught about the requirements they must support as part of the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards.  The Venza Group also is partnering with AGG to create an interactive eLearning module to train hoteliers on general privacy and security awareness issues.