The excitement of new digital possibilities and the pressure of EMV are making retailers’ hearts race, as their store-level data networks—the circulatory system of automation—face new challenges of bandwidth, security and mobile connectivity.
Thankfully, terrestrial, wireless and even improved satellite options appear solid enough for the robust needs of business, leaving retailers with clear choices.
The biggest decision will surround the core wide-area network, the store’s Internet connection. Will it be a terrestrial (land-based line) or wireless solution? Dirk Heinen, CEO of Acumera Inc., Austin, Texas, says his retail clients in recent months have opted for terrestrial solutions for their primary line, with cellular backup. He goes on to suggest a fail-safe power source, be it some sort of battery or generator option.
Security is probably the next biggest concern, with options to introduce data segmentation—a physical or programmed separation between cardholder and store data—at key points. Those could include where payment devices plug into the store switch or hub device, the “perimeter” of the entire store-level system or configured into the data network itself.
“It’s about segmenting access points, printers, PCs and ATMs,” Heinen says. “Anything that doesn’t have [cardholder] data is on a different network, so you can’t get from an access point to the POS segment.”
Third, mobile payment has risen in priority, with much of that process happening within the current payments system. However, pump authorization may soon go directly from a customers’ phone into the cloud—a process that has to activate the pump from the back end.
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