LINKS IN THIS SECTION

- Introduction
- ISP & Hosting Services
- Customer/Partner Communication and Management Systems
- Payment Processing Services

RELATED SECTIONS

- Taxation of Offshore E-commerce
- Regulation of Offshore E-commerce
- Offshore Professional and Financial Services
- Offshore E-commerce Applications

Security remains an important issue for any company intending to conduct e-commerce or e-business over the Internet. Fraud is rife, and while encryption offers a reasonable degree of protection against the theft of credit card details or sensitive data, it does not offer much protection against criminal counter-parties, eg people pretending to be someone they aren't (known, in its most common e-mail form as 'phishing') or people offering worthless stock (pump and dump schemes).

For this reason, the Internet has seen rapid growth in 'certification' schemes, whereby the parties to transactions, or the components of transactions, are 'certified' by a third-party authority or service to be what they say they are. Evidently, certification of identity travels hand-in-hand with certification of value or creditworthiness, and with the insurance of transactions, and has close links to the payments process itself. In almost all cases, e-signature legislation requires certification of signatures as a safeguard, and usually provides a framework within which certification authorities can work.

Offshore e-commerce and e-business are at least as vulnerable to fraud as their onshore equivalents, perhaps more so if there more locations are involved in the commercial process. Encryption is built into payment-processing services, which may be enough for a straightforward offshore retail distribution operation, but for anything more complex (eg a procurement network) it will probably be necessary to source certification procedures independently.

There is no especial offshore dimension to certification as an activity; offshore jurisdictions with established certification services include Bermuda, Cayman, the Isle of Man and Hong Kong.

OFFSHORE E-COMMERCE FACILITIES

- Introduction - A quick overview of the tools, solutions and facilities needed by companies locating e-commerce or e-business operations in an offshore jurisdiction.
- ISP and Hosting Services - The facilities you should look for in an offshore jurisdiction to support an Internet e-commerce or e-business presence.
- Customer/Partner Communication and Management Systems - The front-end systems you will need to communicate with your customers or trading partners including sales and exchange tools.
- Payment Processing Services - How to offer efficient payment processing world-wide from an offshore jurisdiction.