SECURE PAYMENT PROCESSING

Systems and methods for secure payment processing are disclosed. An issuer vault generates payment items, which correspond to consumer account information and which replicate the structure of the account information but do not include consumers' actual account number. The payment items, rather than the actual account information, are communicated to on-line and mobile payment services for use by consumers in payment transactions. When a consumer uses a payment item in a payment transaction and the transaction undergoes authorization processing, the payment authorization network uses the payment item to request and receive the actual account information from the issuer vault. The authorization network uses the actual account information for the limited use of authorizing the transaction. Once the transaction has been authorized using the actual account information, the processing of the transaction continues using the payment item information rather than the actual account information.