There has been considerable growth in the payment ecosystem in the country. Such systems are also highly technology dependent, which necessitate adoption of safety and security measures, which are best in class, on a continuous basis. As per the RBI, not all system providers store the payments data in India.

To ensure better monitoring, it is important to have unfettered supervisory access to data stored with these system providers as also with their service providers / intermediaries/ third party vendors and other entities in the payment ecosystem. The RBI has put in place certain guidelines for storage of payment system data which are as follows:

1. All system providers are required to ensure that the entire data relating to payment systems operated by them are stored in a system only in India. This data should include the full end-to-end transaction details / information collected / carried / processed as part of the message / payment instruction. For the foreign leg of the transaction, if any, the data can also be stored in the foreign country, if required.
2. System providers are required to ensure compliance of (1) above within a period of six months and report compliance of the same to the Reserve Bank latest by October 15, 2018.
3. System providers are required to submit the System Audit Report (SAR) on completion of the requirement at (1) above. The audit should be conducted by CERT-IN empaneled auditors certifying completion of activity at (1) above. The SAR duly approved by the Board of the system providers should be submitted to the Reserve Bank not later than December 31, 2018.

This directive has been issued under Section 10(2) read with Section 18 of Payment and Settlement Systems Act 2007, (Act 51 of 2007).