Getting Started

Welcome to Privacy!

The Privacy developer API provides a predictable and programmatic interface to create and configure virtual cards. Get real-time payment data, programmatically issue cards, configure card permissions, and set spending limits all through one API.

First, you will need a Privacy account. Get started by signing up.

Some functionality is only available with an issuing plan and is marked with Issuing or requires an enhanced setup and is marked Enterprise within the documentation. All functionality is available for free in the sandbox. If you’re interested in features marked as Issuing or Enterprise, check out our Lithic docs.

Sandbox

We offer a free sandbox environment at sandbox.privacy.com that provides all the functionality of api.privacy.com with test payment card numbers. The sandbox requires a separate API key that is also available in the account page.

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We highly recommend you develop and test your app against the sandbox — you are responsible for all financial activity on api.privacy.com associated with your API key

Compliance

In order to comply with US laws and regulations, including the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA), Money Laundering Control Act, U.S. Treasury Department of Foreign Assets Control Regulations (OFAC) FinCEN Rules and Regulations (Code of Federal Regulations Title 31, Chapter X) and various provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act of 2001, the identity of all end user’s must successfully pass the Privacy Customer Identification Program (CIP) before they can transact. Privacy will be unavailable to persons whose identity cannot be reasonably verified. Access will not be granted until verification is successfully completed.

The account holder creation endpoint runs the candidate enrollment through the Privacy CIP and returns a pass or failure. A "pass" indicates that the identity was successfully verified and the end-user can transact. Failures can be one of two types:

(1) The identity could not be verified; or
(2) The identity was verified but ineligible to enroll
Failures of type (1) are able to be retried and may be successful if corrected data is re-submitted (ie. fixed typographical error).

Failures of type (2) should not be retried and the candidate enrollment should be abandoned.

Using the account holder creation endpoint and receiving successful responses is an important part of ensuring your card program is compliant with relevant government and banking regulations. Please note that attempts to bypass the CIP controls or attempting to allow end-users to affect transactions before receiving a successful CIP response is a violation of the Privacy terms of service and may result in service suspension.