Introduction To ISO 8583

5/7/2017 Introduction to ISO 8583 - CodeProject
Introduction to ISO 8583

Suman Kumar, 7 Aug 2010
This article describes the basics of ISO 8583 message format.
Introduction
Whenever we use credit/debit/ATM card, the data traverse from one system to another. A card-based transaction typically needs to
travel between a numbers of systems. For example, a purchase made in a store may travel from the merchant terminal, through an
acquirer network or networks, to the issuing bank where the cardholder's account is held. The transaction carries information about
the type of transaction, the card used, the merchant, the transaction amount, security information, and so on. The response,
authorizing or declining the transaction, needs to be returned via the same route to the terminal.
The data interchange that takes place between different systems needs to follow standard formats for integration, exchange and
interoperability. There are many such standards existing. In Healthcare industry HL7, DICOM (Digital Imaging and Communications in
Medicine) are the protocols implemented by the system, similarly in financial world there are the standards (protocols) ISO8583,
ISO7816 etc, for the various kind of data interchange. ISO (International Organization for Standardization) is a worldwide federation
of national standards bodies. ISO 8593 is Financial Transaction card originated, Interchange message specifications adopted by wide
segment of Payment Industry (including Acquirers and Issuers). Standard can be further extended to support the transactions taking
place between POS (Point of Sale Terminals) and Merchant Acquirer. ISO 8583 specifies message structure, format and content, data
element and values of data elements. Application specification may remain at private level (implementer) and the method (message)
by which settlement takes place is not within the scope of ISO.
Cardholder-originated transactions include purchase, withdrawal, deposit, refund, reversal, balance inquiry, payments and inter-
account transfers. ISO 8583 also defines system-to-system messages for secure key exchanges, reconciliation of totals, and other
administrative purposes.
ISO 8583 Message Structure
The ISO message consists of three major parts; the header, application data, and the trailer. The header and trailer envelop the
application data and are used for routing and message integrity. The application data consist of ISO message including Message
Type Indicator (MTI), BIT MAP (indicating which data elements are present) and ISO Data Element (the fields of the message).
Application Data
Field # Description
0 MTI Message Type Indicator
1 - Bitmap 64 (or 128) bits indicating presence/absence of other fields
2 - 128 Other fields as specified in bitmap
Overall we can visualize the transmission of data trough a pipe in below given order:
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path="m21600,10800qy18019,21600l3581,21600qx,10800,3581,l18019,qx21600,10800xem18019,21600nfqx14438,10800,18019,e"
o:spt="133" /><path o:connecttype="custom" gradientshapeok="t" textboxrect="3581,0,14438,21600"
o:connectlocs="10800,0;0,10800;10800,21600;14438,10800;21600,10800" o:connectangles="270,180,90,0,0" o:extrusionok="f" />
https://www.codeproject.com/Articles/100084/Introduction-to-ISO?display=Print 1/14
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type="#_x0000_t133" /><shadow on="t" /><textbox />
HEADER
</textbox /></shape /><shape id="_x0000_s1028" style="POSITION: absolute; WIDTH: 1380px; HEIGHT: 360px; TOP: 15105px; LEFT:
2640px" type="#_x0000_t133" /><shadow on="t" /><textbox />
MTI
BIT MAP
DATA ELEMENT
TRAILER
</textbox /></shape /></group />
Now we can jump into details of the different components of the application data.
Message Type Indicator (MTI)
This is a 4 digit numeric field, which classifies the high level function of the message. A Message Type Indicator includes the ISO 8583
version, the Message Class, Message Sub-class, and Transaction Originator. Different versions of the ISO 8583 standard are indicated
in the first position of the Message Type Indicator.
0xxx ISO 8583:1987 version
1xxx ISO 8583:1993 version
2xxx Reserved for ISO use
8xxx Reserved for national use
9xxx Reserved for private use
Message Class
Message Sub-class
Incrementing the fourth position by one indicates a repeat request (except in x300 messages). For example: 1100 = Authorization
Request; 1101 Authorization Request Repeat.
Transaction Originator
Transaction
Description
Originator
0 Acquirer
1 Acquirer repeat
2 Card issuer
3 Card issuer repeat
4 Other
5 Other repeat
6-9 Reserved for ISO use
So by knowing the MTI value we can identify the type of message. For Example: If MTI value is 1200, then from the table above we
can find other details. First position is for Version Number and value in MTI is 1, so message version is based on ISO 8583:1993.
Second Position is for Message Class and value in MTI is 2, so message is a financial message. Third position is for message sub-
class/function and the value in MTI is 0, so the given message is a request message. Fourth position is for Transaction Originator and
value in MTI is 0, so the message is coming from Acquirer. When we consolidate all these we do find that message with MTI value
1200 is an ISO 1993 Financial Request Message sent by Acquirer.
So if we summarize, then Message Class/Type is (a n4 - 4 Digits Numeric Value) required for all ISO 8583 messages in order to
identify the message class and the Message Type can be one of the following values (this is a partial list):
MTI Description
x100 Authorization Request
x101 Authorization Request Repeat
x102 Authorization completion confirmation
x103 Authorization completion confirmation repeat
x110 Authorization Response
x112 Authorization completion response
x120 Authorization Advice
x121 Authorization advice repeat
x122 Authorization advice completion confirmation
x123 Authorization advice completion confirmation Report
x130 Authorization Advice Response
x132 Authorization advice completion response
x200 Financial Request
x210 Financial Response
x220 Financial Advice
x230 Financial Advice Response
x300 Acquirer File Update Request
x302 Issuer File Update Request
x310 Acquirer File Update Response
x312 Issuer File Update Response
x320 Acquirer File Update Advice
x322 Issuer File Update Advice
x330 Acquirer File Update Advice Response
x332 Issuer File Update Advice Response
x400 Acquirer Reversal Request
x402 Issuer Reversal Request
x410 Acquirer Reversal Request Response
x412 Issuer Reversal Request Response
x420 Acquirer Reversal Advice
x422 Issuer Reversal Advice
x430 Acquirer Reversal Advice Response
x432 Issuer Reversal Advice Response
x5xx Reconciliation Request Messages
x6xx Administrative Request Messages
x800 Network Management Request
x810 Network Management Request Response
Bitmap(s)
A bitmap is an indexing technique used in an ISO 8583 message to indicate which Data Elements are present. The presence of a data
element in a specific message is indicated by a one (1) in the assigned position; a zero (0) indicates the absence of a data element in
the assigned position. Each application transaction includes one (1) bit map. A bit map consists of 64 bits numbered from the left
starting with bit 1. The first bit of the bit map represents a secondary bit map. If any ISO message does not support secondary bit
map processing, then the first bit of the bit map is '0'.
Bit 1 Bit 2 Bit 3 Bit 4 Bit 64
Field 1 Field 2 Field 64

Field 3 Field 4
Secondary bit map. 1 if Primary Account Message Auth
Processing Code Amount, Trans
present else 0 Number Code
A message contains at least one bitmap called the Primary Bitmap, indicating the presence of Data Elements 1 up to 64.
A Secondary Bitmap may be located at Data Element one, and hence the first bit in Primary Bitmap tells us whether there is a
secondary bitmap or not. The secondary bitmap indicates the presence of Data Elements 65 up to 128.
A message can contain up to three bitmaps in the latest version of the ISO 8583 standard. The bitmap may be transmitted as 8 bytes
(binary), or sometimes with the 8 bytes unpacked into 16 hexadecimal characters 1-9, A-F (ASCII).
Data Elements
Data Elements are fields carrying the information of the transaction itself. There are up to 128 Data Elements in the original ISO 8583
(1987) standard, and up to 192 Data Elements in later releases. Each Data Element has a specified meaning and format. ISO 8583 also
includes some general purpose Data Elements and system-specific Data Elements that are used in different ways by different
standards derived from ISO 8583.
For example: Bit value 2 is assigned to Primary Account Number, 3 is assigned to Processing Code, 4 is for Transaction Amount
similarly, and so on. And bit value 128 is for Message Authentication Code Field. For each data element ISO specifies the data format
and size. ISO also specifies which all data elements are mandatory or optional for a particular message.
Data Element Format

ISO-8583 specifies different kind of fields that basically fall in following categories:
Fixed length
Numeric
Alphanumeric
Binary
Variable length
Max-length 99
Numeric
Alphanumeric
Binary
Max-length 999
Numeric
Alphanumeric
Binary
Nested message
Each Data Element has a standard format. This consists of the allowed content of the field (numeric, binary, etc) as well as the allowed
length. This is indicated by the convention of allowed content followed by length as described in the following sections.
Field Type Attributes
Abbreviation Meaning
a Alphabetic, including Blanks
n Numeric Values only
s Special Characters only
an Alphanumeric
as Alphabetic & Special Characters only
ns Numeric and Special Characters only
ans Alphabetic, numeric & Special Characters
b Binary Data
z Tracks 2 & 3 code set as defined in ISO 7811 & ISO 7813
h Hex Data
Length of variable field that follows. LL - Two-digit length indicator (1 byte BCD) LLL -
LL, LLL
3-digit length indicator (2 bytes BCD)
Variable field of up to 17. The .. is a two-digit length indicator (1 byte BCD) specifying
..17 the number of digits defining the length of the variable data to follow.
..125 Variable field of up to 125 characters. The is a three-digit length indicator (2 bytes
BCD), specifying the number of digits defining the length of the variable data to follow.
A Data Element may have a fixed or variable length. A length indicator precedes a variable length field in a message.
Fixed Length Data Element

Fixed-length Data Elements have a defined length in the ISO 8583 standard, and no length indicator is required in the message.
These are indicated by including the length after the allowed content e.g. Data Element 3 has format 'n6', which means a fixed-length
field of 6 numeric digits.
Variable Length Data Element

Other data elements may have variable length, and a length indicator is included before the data element in the message. The length
indicator itself has a defined length: for example, a 1-digit length indicator is only sufficient for a variable-length field with a length
from 1 up to 9, while a 3-digit length indicator can support field values up to 999.
Variable length fields are indicated by two dots '..' followed by the maximum length of the field. The length indicator is represented
by a number of 'L' characters corresponding to the length of the length indicator e.g. Data Element 2 has format n..19, LLVAR which
means a field with a maximum of 19 numeric digits with a 2-digit length indicator.
The problem is not complexity but diversity, ISO-8583 is not specific about how a given field is represented, so you can have a
numeric field represented as a sequence of ASCII characters, EBCDIC characters, BCD, etc.
Variable length fields have a prefix specifying its length, but how this is represented is not defined, different vendors uses different
representations (i.e. BCD, EBCDIC, binary value).
Sample Messages
[Refer Appendix A for number system basics]
Sample 1: 0800 Message
# Name Value Hex Value
0 MTI 0800 08 00
Indicates presence of fields 3, 11

1 PRIMARY BITMAP 20 20 00 00 00 80 00 00
and 41
3 PROCESSING CODE 000000 00 00 00
11 SYSTEM TRACE AUDIT NUMBER 000001 00 00 01
CARD ACCEPTOR TERMINAL

41 29110001 32 39 31 31 30 30 30 31
IDENTIFICATION
Here is the binary representation of our 0800 message:
080020200000008000000000000000013239313130303031
In above example, 0800 is the message type indicator; first position represents version number:
0 is for version 1987
Second position is message class:
8 is for network management
Third position is message sub-class/function:
0 is for request
And last position is used to describe transaction originator:
0 is for acquirer
So "0800" is a version 1987 network management request.
Next we have field 1, primary bitmap:
Primary Bitmap
Byte Hex Value Bit Value Field #
0 20 0010 0000 3
1 20 0010 0000 11
2 00 0000 0000
3 00 0000 0000
4 00 0000 0000
5 80 1000 0000 41
6 00 0000 0000
7 00 0000 0000
So we've parsed MTI, (0800) bitmap (2020000000800000), we know fields 3, 11 and 41 are present, so our next field is number 3.
In our example, field #3 is using a BCD representation, so a value of "000000" is represented with just three bytes whose values are
"00 00 00". Same goes for field #11 whose value is "000001", it's represented as "00 00 01". In our example, field #41 is an 8-byte
alphanumeric field represented as 8 ASCII characters
Message: 08002020 00000080 00000000 00000001
32393131 30303031
MTI: 0800
Bitmap: 20200000 00800000
Field 03: 000000
Field 11: 000001
Field 41: 3239313130303031 (ASCII for "29110001")
Sample 2: Another 0800 message
In above sample, two new fields#60 and #70 are present. Here is our message representation:
Message: 0800A020 00000080 00100400 00000000
00000000 00000001 32393131 30303031
00105445 5354204D 45535347 0301
MTI: 0800
Primary bitmap: A0200000 00800010
Secondary bitmap: 04000000 00000000
Field 03: 000000
Field 11: 000001
Field 41: 3239313130303031 (ASCII for "29110001")
Field 60: 0010 54455354204D45535347 (length=10, value="TEST MESSG")
Field 70: 0301
Let's break down this bitmap:
Primary Bitmap
0 A0 1010 0000 Secondary bitmap present plus #3
1 20 0010 0000 11
2 00 0000 0000
3 00 0000 0000
4 00 0000 0000
5 80 1000 0000 41
6 00 0000 0000
7 10 0001 0000 60
Secondary Bitmap
0 04 0000 0100 70
1 00 0000 0000
2 00 0000 0000
3 00 0000 0000
4 00 0000 0000
5 80 0000 0000
6 00 0000 0000
7 00 0000 0000
To make things complex to developers, different vendors choose different padding styles when handling odd length BCD fields. So in
order to represent "003" one vender may use two bytes with the values "00 03" while another may use "00 30".
Same goes for variable length fields, field length as well as field values can be padded right or left, that's not defined by ISO-8583, it's
just a matter of fact of different implementations.
Then we have nested fields, some implementations use reserved for private use fields to carry other ISO-8583 messages. These
messages are usually packed as variable length binary fields as seen by outer message.
Real Life Samples

A real example may help us to understand what kind of information is exchanged during an authorization request, and response:
Sample Authorization Request
Field # Description Value Comments
0 MTI 0100 Authorization request
2 Primary Account Number 4321123443211234
3 Processing Code 000000
4 Transaction Amount 000000012300 i.e. 123.00
7 Transmission data/time 0304054133 MMYYHHMMSS
11 System trace audit number 001205
14 Expiration date 0205 YYMM
18 Merchant Type 5399
22 POS Entry Mode 022 Swiped Card
25 POS Condition Code 00
35 4321123443211234=02051 2312312332 Track 2
37 Retrieval Reference Number 206305000014
41 Terminal ID 29110001
42 Merchant ID 1001001
49 Currency 840 American Dollars
Sample Authorization Response
Transmission protocol
Once we have a binary representation of a given ISO-8583 message we have to transmit it over the wire using some communication
protocol (i.e. TCP/IP, UDP/IP, X.25, SDLC, SNA, ASYNC, QTP, SSL, etc.).
ISO-8583 does not define any communication protocol; so different vendors have chosen different protocols. Many implementations
(specially old ones) require support for some kind of routing information (i.e. a CICS transaction name), so they use different sorts of
headers. A few of them (specially stream based ones) require some kind of trailers as well.
Transmission protocol is composed of an
Optional header
ISO-8583 message data
Optional trailers
A TCP/IP based implementations may use a couple of bytes to indicate message length, so our 0800 example described earlier would
be sent as:
00 46 08 00 A0 20 00 00 00 80 00 10 04 00 00 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 32 39 31 31 30 30
30 31 00 10 54 45 53 54 20 4D 45 53 53 47 03 01
0046 is the message length expressed in network byte order.
But this is just one way of specifying message length, other implementation may choose to send four ASCII bytes, i.e.
30 30 34 36 08 00 A0 20 00 00 00 80 00 10 04 00
00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 32 39 31 31
30 30 30 31 00 10 54 45 53 54 20 4D 45 53 53 47
03 01
30303436 being the ASCII representation of "0046".
A few of them perform odd things with those headers, flagging rejected messages (i.e. you send a 0100 and instead of receiving a
0110 with a suitable response code you get back your own 0100 with some proprietary flag in the header indicating for example a
temporarily failure such as destination unreachable).
Conclusion
There are many different implementations of ISO8583, and many local variations. Although ISO 8583 defines a common standard, it
is not typically used directly by systems or networks. Instead, there are a number of different standards in use on different transaction
networks, all based on ISO 8583 but with proprietary variations.
Appendix A
Number System
The base value of a number system is the number of different values the set has before repeating itself. For example, decimal has a
base of ten values, 0 to 9. Different number system and its base value are as below:
Binary = 2 (0, 1)
Octal = 8 (0 - 7)
Decimal = 10 (0 - 9)
Duodecimal = 12 (used for some purposes by the Romans)
Hexadecimal = 16 (0 - 9, A-F)
Vigesimal = 20 (used by the Mayans)
Sexagesimal = 60 (used by the Babylonians)
Binary Number System is commonly used in computers. For detailed discussion, please refer to any elementary computing science
book.
Nibble
A nibble is group of four bits, or half an octet (an octet being an 8-bit byte). As a nibble contains four bits, there are sixteen (24)
possible values, so a nibble corresponds to a single hexadecimal digit (thus, it is often referred to as a "hex digit" or "hexit"). A full
byte is represented by two hexadecimal digits. Therefore, it is common to display a byte of information as two nibbles. A set of three
nibbles can be referred as a tribble. The nibble is often called a semioctet in a networking or telecommunication context.
BCD
Binary code decimal digits (0-9) are represented using FOUR bits. The valid combinations of bits and their respective values are
Binary Value Digit
0000 0
0001 1
0010 2
0011 3
0100 4
0101 5
0110 6
0111 7
1000 8
1001 9
The binary combinations 1010 to 1111 are invalid and are not used.
If the computer stores one BCD digit per byte, then it is called normal BCD. The unused nibble may be either all 0's or all 1's.
If two BCD digits are stored per byte, it is called Packed BCD. This occurs in data transmission where numbers are being transmitted
over a communications link. Packed BCD reduces the amount of time spent transmitting the numbers, as each data byte transmitted
results in the sending of two BCD digits.
Consider the storing of the digits 56 in Packed BCD format.
7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 < Bit Number
0 1 0 1 0 1 1 0
MSB LSB
The UPPER nibble holds the value 5, whilst the LOWER nibble holds the value 6. So the BCD equivalent of (56) 10 is (0101 0110) BCD.
EBCDIC
EBCDIC (Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code) is an 8-bit character encoding. EBCDIC was developed separately from
ASCII. EBCDIC is an 8-bit encoding, versus the 7-bit encoding of ASCII. A single EBCDIC byte occupies eight bits, which are divided in
two halves or nibbles. The first four bits is called the zone and represent the category of the character, whereas the last four bits is
called the digit and identify the specific character.
EBCDIC/ASCII Tables Equivalency
Character EBCDIC ASCII Character EBCDIC ASCII
HEX/BINARY HEX/BINARY HEX/BINARY HEX/BINARY
A C1 1100 0001 41 0100 0001 S E2 1110 0010 53 0101 0011
B C2 1100 0010 42 0100 0010 T E3 1110 0011 54 0101 0100
C C3 1100 0011 43 0100 0011 U E4 1110 0100 55 0101 0101
D C4 1100 0100 44 0100 0100 V E5 1110 0101 56 0101 0110
E C5 1100 0101 45 0100 0101 W E6 1110 0110 57 0101 0111
F C6 1100 0110 46 0100 0110 X E7 1110 0111 58 0101 1000
G C7 1100 0111 47 0100 0111 Y E8 1110 1000 59 0101 1001
H C8 1100 1000 48 0100 1000 Z E9 1110 1001 5A 0101 1010
I C9 1100 1001 49 01001 001 0 F0 1111 0000 30 0011 0000
J D1 1101 0001 4A 0100 1010 1 F1 1111 0001 31 0011 0001
K D2 1101 0010 4B 0100 1011 2 F2 1111 0010 32 0011 0010
L D3 1101 0011 4C 0100 1100 3 F3 1111 0011 33 0010 0110
M D4 1101 0100 4D 0100 1101 4 F4 1111 0100 34 0011 0100
N D5 1101 0101 4E 0100 1110 5 F5 1111 0101 35 0011 0101
O D6 1101 0110 4F 0100 1111 6 F6 1111 0110 36 0011 0110
P D7 1101 0111 50 0101 0000 7 F7 1111 0111 37 0011 0111
Q D8 1101 1000 51 0101 0001 8 F8 1111 1000 38 0011 1000
R D9 1101 1001 52 0101 0010 9 F9 1111 1001 39 0011 1001
Space 40 0100 0000 20 0010 0000
Example:
46 (Decimal) = 101110 (Binary) = 2E (Hex) = 0100 0110 (BCD) = 34 36 (ASCII) = F4 F6 (EBCDIC)
License
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About the Author
Suman KumarNo Biography provided

Web Developer
India
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5/7/2017 Introduction to ISO 8583 - CodeProject

This article describes the basics of ISO 8583 message format.

ISO 8583 Message Structure

0 MTI Message Type Indicator

1 - Bitmap 64 (or 128) bits indicating presence/absence of other fields

2 - 128 Other fields as specified in bitmap

</textbox /></shape /></group />

Message Type Indicator (MTI)

0xxx ISO 8583:1987 version

1xxx ISO 8583:1993 version

2xxx Reserved for ISO use

3xxx Reserved for ISO use

4xxx Reserved for ISO use

5xxx Reserved for ISO use

6xxx Reserved for ISO use

7xxx Reserved for ISO use

8xxx Reserved for national use

9xxx Reserved for private use

3 Card issuer repeat

6-9 Reserved for ISO use

x100 Authorization Request

x101 Authorization Request Repeat

x102 Authorization completion confirmation

x103 Authorization completion confirmation repeat

x110 Authorization Response

x112 Authorization completion response

x120 Authorization Advice

x121 Authorization advice repeat

x122 Authorization advice completion confirmation

x123 Authorization advice completion confirmation Report

x130 Authorization Advice Response

x132 Authorization advice completion response

x200 Financial Request

x210 Financial Response

x220 Financial Advice

x230 Financial Advice Response

x300 Acquirer File Update Request

x302 Issuer File Update Request

x310 Acquirer File Update Response

x312 Issuer File Update Response

x320 Acquirer File Update Advice

x322 Issuer File Update Advice

x330 Acquirer File Update Advice Response

x332 Issuer File Update Advice Response

x400 Acquirer Reversal Request

x402 Issuer Reversal Request

x410 Acquirer Reversal Request Response

x412 Issuer Reversal Request Response

x420 Acquirer Reversal Advice

x422 Issuer Reversal Advice

x430 Acquirer Reversal Advice Response

x432 Issuer Reversal Advice Response

x5xx Reconciliation Request Messages

x6xx Administrative Request Messages

x800 Network Management Request

x810 Network Management Request Response

Bit 1 Bit 2 Bit 3 Bit 4 Bit 64

Field 1 Field 2 Field 64

Data Element Format

Field Type Attributes

a Alphabetic, including Blanks

n Numeric Values only