Our products and services may not function as intended due to errors in our or our third-party providers’ software, hardware, and systems, product defects, or due to security breaches or human error in administering these systems, which could materially and adversely affect our business.
Our services are based on sophisticated software and computer systems and we may encounter delays when developing new applications and services. Further, our or our third-party providers’ software may contain undetected vulnerabilities, errors or defects. In addition, we may experience difficulties in installing or integrating our technology on systems or with other programs used by our third-party providers. Defects in our or our third-party providers’ software, errors or delays in the processing of electronic transactions or other difficulties could result in interruption of business operations, delay in market acceptance, additional development and remediation costs, diversion of technical and other resources, loss of customers or customer data, negative publicity or exposure to liability claims. Although we attempt to limit our potential liability through disclaimers and limitation of liability provisions in our license and other agreements, we cannot be certain that these measures will successfully limit our liability.
Additionally, electronic payment products and services, including ours, have been, and could continue to be in the future, specifically targeted and penetrated or disrupted by hackers. Because the techniques used to obtain unauthorized access to data, products, and services and to disable, degrade, or sabotage them change frequently and may be difficult to detect or remediate for long periods of time, we and our customers may be unable to anticipate these techniques to implement adequate preventative measures to stop them. If we, our customers or third-party service providers are unable to anticipate or prevent these attacks, our customers’ businesses may be harmed, our reputation could be damaged, and we could incur significant liability.
Our systems and our third-party providers’ systems may be subject to system failures or capacity constraints, and resulting interruptions in the availability of our platform, products, or services, including the accessibility of our solutions through mobile devices, could harm our business.
Our systems and those of our third-party providers, including data center facilities, may experience service interruptions, cyberattacks and other security incidents, including as a result of human error, earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, fires, other natural disasters, power losses, disruptions in telecommunications services, fraud, military or political conflicts, terrorist attacks and other geopolitical unrest, computer viruses, changes in social, political or regulatory conditions or in laws and policies, or other changes or events. Our systems and facilities are also subject to break-ins, sabotage, and acts of vandalism. Some of our systems are not fully redundant, and our disaster-recovery planning is not sufficient for all eventualities. In addition, as a provider of payments solutions and other financial services, we are subject to increased scrutiny by regulators that may require specific business continuity and disaster recovery plans and more rigorous testing of such plans. This increased scrutiny may be costly and time-consuming and may divert our resources from other business priorities.
We have experienced and will likely continue to experience denial-of-service and other cyberattacks, system failures, security incidents, and other events or conditions that interrupt the availability or reduce the speed or functionality of our products and services. These events may result in loss of revenue. In addition, they could result in significant expense to repair or replace damaged equipment and remedy resultant data loss or corruption. A prolonged interruption in the availability or reduction in the speed or other functionality of our products or services could materially harm our reputation and business. Frequent or persistent interruptions in our products and services could cause customers to believe that our products and services are unreliable, leading them to switch to our competitors or to avoid our products and services, and could permanently harm our reputation and business. Moreover, to the extent that any system failure or similar event results in damages to customers or their businesses, these customers could seek compensation from us for their losses, and those claims, even if unsuccessful, would likely be time-consuming and costly for us to address.
A significant natural or man-made disaster could have a material and adverse impact on our business. The insurance we maintain may not be sufficient to compensate us for the potentially significant losses that could result from disruptions to our services. Significant natural or other disasters could also have a material and adverse impact on our sellers, which, in the aggregate, could in turn adversely affect our results of operations.
Our risk management framework, including our counterparty risk management, may not be fully effective in mitigating our risk exposure against all types of risks.
We operate in a rapidly changing industry. Accordingly, our risk management policies and procedures may not be fully effective to identify, monitor and manage all risks our business encounters. In addition, when we introduce new services, focus on new business types, or begin to operate in markets where we have a limited history of fraud loss, we may be less able to forecast and reserve accurately for those losses. If our policies and procedures are not fully effective or we are not successful in identifying and mitigating