Peppercoin Small Transaction Suite First to Complete Visa CISP and Other Credit Card Data Security Compliance Validation.

CHICAGO & WALTHAM, Mass. -- Ambiron's Multi-Card Compliance Program Helps Protect Against Security Breaches

Ambiron, a firm specializing in information security and compliance services, and Peppercoin, a payments company that enables profitable, new business models for low-priced digital content and physical goods, today announced that the Peppercoin Small Transaction Suite is the first small payments solution to receive Visa CISP and MasterCard SDP certification and validate compliance with the data security programs of the major credit card associations.

To validate compliance, Peppercoin leveraged Ambiron's Multi-Card Compliance Program (MCCP), a proprietary assessment process that aggregates all credit card data security standards. Peppercoin demonstrated compliance with the data security standards set forth by all the major credit card associations, including:

--Visa Cardholder Information Security Program (CISP)

--Visa Account Information Security (AIS)

--MasterCard Site Data Protection (SDP)

--American Express Data Security Operating Policy (DSOP)

--Discover Information Security and Compliance (DISC)

"Peppercoin is committed to complying with credit card association guidelines and enabling card association revenue growth by helping convert the $1.32 trillion in annual cash small payments into card payments," said Mark Friedman, president of Peppercoin. "Through Ambiron's program, we have validated Peppercoin's ability to integrate securely and seamlessly within the existing payments infrastructure. Financial service companies can rapidly deploy Peppercoin's suite, which is designed for scalability as market demand grows."

With the business model flexibility offered by Peppercoin's Small Transaction Suite, merchants will increase revenue and profits via small payments in the digital, mobile and physical point-of-sale markets. As a result, Peppercoin will drive significant additional volume over the existing payments network.

Ambiron Vital Signs(TM), a vulnerability and compliance management system designed to meet the specific information security requirements of businesses that store, process and/or transmit credit card data, will monitor Peppercoin's systems to help maintain compliance.

"Peppercoin is an ideal company to take advantage of Ambiron's vulnerability management and compliance solutions," said Robert J. McCullen, co-founder and managing partner of Ambiron. "Peppercoin demonstrated quickly that their operations and payment processing systems exceed our compliance requirements, and that their Small Transaction Suite is ready for immediate deployment."

The data security programs of the card associations were recently aligned into the Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standards. Through Ambiron's MCCP, Peppercoin has validated compliance with the PCI Data Security Standards.

About Peppercoin, Inc.

Peppercoin enables profitable new business models for low-priced digital content and physical goods. Peppercoin's small payment products help merchants, banks, and other payments companies build market adoption quickly through a flexible, consumer-friendly approach. Peppercoin integrates easily with existing business models and systems to accelerate revenues and increase profits while dramatically lowering transaction and customer service costs. For more information visit www.peppercoin.com.

About Ambiron

Ambiron provides data security and compliance services to businesses in the financial services vertical. For the payment industry, we help banks, merchants and service providers mitigate their risk by validating compliance with the card association data security programs for American Express, Discover, MasterCard, Visa Canada and Visa USA. For companies in the electronic trading business, we provide services that enable a secure, stable platform for processing transactions. Headquartered in Chicago with offices throughout the United States, Ambiron's staff is composed of network and data security professionals who have substantial experience in delivering services to large and mid-sized companies. To learn more about Ambiron, please visit www.ambiron.net.