Payments and Compliance Glossary
Plain-English definitions for the acronyms and concepts used across merchant monitoring, acquirer compliance, and card-brand rules.
BRAM Compliance
Mastercard's Business Risk Assessment and Mitigation rule set. Defines prohibited merchant content categories and the monitoring obligations acquirers must meet.
Read definitionMATCH List
Mastercard's global terminated merchant file. Acquirers must screen new merchants against it and report terminations into it for severe violations.
Read definitionMMSP
Merchant Monitoring Service Provider. An accredited third party that crawls, classifies, and alerts on merchant content on behalf of an acquirer.
Read definitionMCC Drift
When a merchant's actual website content no longer matches the Merchant Category Code they were approved under. A leading indicator of category pivots and transaction laundering.
Read definitionMastercard MMP
Mastercard Merchant Monitoring Program. The framework that requires acquirers to continuously monitor merchant websites for prohibited content and report findings.
Read definitionKYB
Know Your Business. The process of verifying a commercial merchant's legal entity, ownership, and operating status. KYB complements KYC, which checks individuals.
Read definitionTransaction Laundering
When a merchant uses an approved payment account to process transactions for a different, undisclosed (and often prohibited) business. Also called factoring.
Read definitionGeo-Cloaking
When a merchant website serves different content depending on the visitor's geolocation. Typically, clean content to regulators and prohibited content to target customers.
Read definitioneKYC
Electronic Know Your Customer. Remote identity verification using document OCR, face capture, liveness detection, and face match. Used for director eKYC during merchant onboarding.
Read definitionSSM (Malaysia)
Suruhanjaya Syarikat Malaysia, the Companies Commission of Malaysia. The authoritative registrar for all Malaysian companies and businesses.
Read definitionAdverse Media
Negative news, regulatory actions, or criminal investigations involving a merchant or its directors. Screening adverse media is a standard part of KYB and ongoing monitoring.
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