The Address Verification Service, or AVS, is a payment address verification system designed to protect financial transactions from fraud. The principle behind AVS is that during online payment, the payer must enter their payment address, as specified in their issuing bank. The payment system sends the received data to the issuing bank, which verifies the two addresses. If the information is correct, the payment is approved. AVS was developed by the payment system MasterCard but is actively used by other services.
The payment address verification system protects against various types of credit card data theft. Even if a fraudster has card data, they will not be able to make a payment because they do not know the address specified in the bank. However, AVS has its drawbacks. For example, the real cardholder may make a mistake when entering the address, causing the system to reject their payment. As a result, an online store may lose a real customer. It is best to use the AVS system in combination with other protection mechanisms, such as 3D-Secure. This will provide maximum protection against fraudsters and safeguard the funds of clients.
