SOC Compliance - Build Trust for Your Organization
Acquirer-led Investigation
Gain the power of structured forensic investigations to meet card scheme mandates, uncover root causes, and strengthen payment security.
Why it matters
Acquirer-Led Investigation Becomes Essential When a Payment Incident Triggers External Scrutiny, Compliance Obligations, or Questions of Responsibility
Fraud monitoring alerts: Card schemes flagging elevated fraud activity
Data security concerns: Unprotected card data storage or weak PCI DSS posture
Breach Notifications: Card schemes notifying acquirers of potential exposure
Merchant compromise suspicion: Forensic red flags in a merchant’s Cardholder Data Environment (CBE)
Third party compromise: Service providers linked to merchant payment processing found at risk
Our Approach
Our Approach
SISA’s Acquirer-Led Investigation combines technical depth with business clarity to ensure defensible outcomes for both acquirers and card schemes.
Engage with card schemes and affected merchant
Define investigation scope based on scheme requirements and acquirer mandate
Acquire merchant system logs, payment application data and POS server images
Ensure chain-of-custody documentation for all collected artifacts
Conduct triage of digital artifacts for Indicators of Compromise (IoCs)
Identify immediate gaps such as missing patches, insecure storage or weak authentication
Get independent assurance on controls related to security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, and privacy at a point in time.
SOC 2 Type I report aligned with Trust Services Criteria
Validate control design for customer, partner, and regulator trust
Provide evidence packages and management assertion support
Map out the kill chain:
Ingress point of how attackers entered merchant systems.
Lateral movement spread within payment processing networks.
Card data exposure that includes validation of cardholder data access or exfiltration.
Validate PCI DSS compliance gaps contributing to compromise.
Prepare Acquirer-led investigation report (aligned to card scheme requirements).
Provide root cause analysis (RCA), incident timeline and merchant-specific vulnerabilities.
Share remediation roadmap for the merchant to restore compliance.
Service Offerings
Our Acquirer-Led Investigation Delivers the Evidence, Analysis, and Reporting Required to Support High-Stakes Payment Investigations
Acquirer Investigation Report: Structured findings for submission to card schemes.
Root Cause Analysis (RCA): Identification of vulnerabilities and entry vectors.
Incident Timeline: Step-by-step reconstruction of the attack.
Evidence Pack: Forensically preserved artifacts to support regulatory review.
Merchant Compliance Assessment: PCI DSS gaps mapped to the incident.
Remediation Recommendations: Actionable steps to secure systems and reduce acquirer liability.
BENEFITS
Our Acquirer-Led Investigation Helps You Respond to External Scrutiny with Clarity, Confidence, and Defensible Evidence
Validate the incident with precision through structured forensic investigation and scope confirmation
Understand what was affected across systems, payment flows, and sensitive data environments
Meet acquirer and card-brand expectations with investigation outputs aligned to formal requirements
Preserve defensible evidence for audits, regulatory review, and legal scrutiny
Reduce uncertainty during a high-pressure event with clear findings and practical next steps
Strengthen payment security posture through targeted remediation tied directly to forensic findings
WHY SISA
SISA Acquirer-Led Investigation Combines Payment Forensics Leadership with Defensible Reporting for Card-Brand and Acquirer-Driven Cases
Proven acquirer engagement
Extensive experience in supporting acquirers during scheme-driven investigations.
Card scheme alignment
Findings and reports accepted across Visa, Mastercard, Amex, and RuPay networks.
Forensic depth
Expertise in, memory forensics, malware detection, and log correlation.
Regulatory credibility
Evidence and reports defensible in card scheme audits and regulatory reviews.
Rapid turnaround
Accelerated investigation and reporting to meet strict scheme timelines.
Merchant ecosystem expertise
Familiarity with diverse merchant environments including retail, e-commerce, hospitality, and payment processors.
Notified by a card scheme of potential merchant compromise?
Engage SISA’s Acquirer-led Investigation experts.
FAQs
An acquirer-led investigation is a targeted compliance and security review initiated by an acquiring bank (the financial institution that processes a merchant’s credit card payments) to investigate suspected fraud or data risk at a client merchant's location.
This typically impacts travel, retail, and digital merchants. Fundamentally, any industry doing a high volume of online or point-of-sale card transactions can trigger an acquirer-led investigation if their merchant bank detects unusual chargebacks or potential data leaks.
The primary goal is to evaluate the merchant's current security environment, verify their actual compliance with PCI DSS standards, determine if a data compromise has occurred, and establish immediate remediation requirements to protect the merchant bank from liability.
An acquirer-led review is typically initiated as a proactive or early-stage step when suspicious activity is detected, but before global card networks officially declare a major data breach that mandates a full Payment Forensics Investigation (PFI).
Merchants must provide their latest Self-Assessment Questionnaires (SAQs), recent vulnerability scanning reports, network architecture diagrams, firewall configurations, and log records showing how cardholder data environments are accessed.
If severe security gaps or non-compliance are discovered, the merchant faces increased transaction processing fees, direct financial penalties from the acquirer, or the complete suspension of their merchant account, halting their ability to accept card payments.
Merchants must execute a formal remediation plan outlined by the investigator. This includes closing network vulnerabilities, implementing missing technical controls, and undergoing a verification scan to prove their payment architecture is secure.
SISA acts as an expert intermediary during acquirer-led investigations. We conduct efficient technical assessments, pinpoint the root causes of suspicious transaction anomalies, and deliver clear remediation strategies that protect merchants and reassure acquiring banks.
Hear what our customers say
Over the past three years, SISA has been a trusted cybersecurity partner, helping us strengthen our security posture through services such as Breach and Attack Simulation (BAS), Advanced Threat Hunting and monitoring via their ProACT Agentic SOC platform. Their practical, real-world threat simulations have provided valuable visibility into the effectiveness of our security controls, enabling us to identify gaps, prioritize improvements, and enhance threat detection and response capabilities. SISA’s expertise, responsiveness, and outcome-focused approach have made them a reliable partner in advancing our overall cybersecurity resilience.
Sreerag V M
Cybersecurity Manager in EqualizeRCM Services
SISA Sappers has been a trusted Digital Forensics and Incident Response partner, consistently demonstrating strong expertise in cybersecurity, incident response, digital forensics, and threat investigations. Their team delivers timely updates, maintains clear and effective communication, and provides comprehensive, well-structured reporting, ensuring transparency throughout each engagement. SISA collaborates closely with our internal teams to effectively manage and resolve complex cyber incidents and security challenges. Their professionalism, technical capabilities, and actionable recommendations have contributed significantly to strengthening our security posture, improving incident response capabilities, and enhancing overall cyber resilience.
MJ
Security Lead, A Leading Financial Institution in South East Asia
SISA’s Breach and Attack Simulation gave us practical visibility into how our security controls performed under real-world attack scenarios. The simulations across external, internal, and O365 environments helped us identify which controls were effective, where gaps existed, and what needed immediate attention. Because SISA’s detection capabilities were already integrated into our environment, we could also better understand how attacks were detected and handled across different stages of the simulation. What stood out most was the transparency of the engagement and the actionable guidance the team provided throughout the process.
Tej Pratap Bisht
Head of Cybersecurity & DevSecOps, Reach Mobile
