Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals

A massive, 13-year-old legal case pitting merchants against the bank card networks and big issuers over credit card interchange could be nearing a settlement, according to regulatory filings and press reports. Mastercard disclosed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing Thursday that negotiations among the parties are moving along and …

Equifax Inc. disclosed Wednesday that it has entered into a consent order with eight states that requires it to improve its data-protection practices in the wake of the huge data breach last year at the national credit-reporting agency. The breach compromised personal data on approximately 148 million consumers, including Social …

LaterPay Inc. released its LaterPay button as a tool to decrease payment friction, especially for nonprofit organizations and journalism sites, the company announced Thursday. Munich-based LaterPay, which has a U.S. office in New York City, says the button is designed to be a low-friction way to enable consumers to make …

It has been a busy week in the cryptocurrency business. On Thursday, technology vendor Fit Pay Inc. announced it is closer to shipping a contactless coin-shaped device called Flip that allows consumers to convert their Bitcoin to U.S. dollars so they can make purchases. Earlier, news emerged that the online …

ATM manufacturer NCR Corp. said it integrated AFS TrueChecks, a service from Advanced Fraud Solutions for preventing check fraud, into its platform for interactive teller machines. Shift4 Payments announced an integration with Megasys Hospitality Solutions, developer of the Portfolio HMS software application for lodging businesses. AvidXchange, a startup providing payment-automation …

Merchants selling digital goods were dealt a heavy blow last year as the fraud rate for the category soared 167%, finds the Fraud Attack Index from online-fraud prevention specialist Forter and the Merchant Risk Council, a merchant group that addresses fraud prevention. Released Tuesday, the index also found that account …

Captiva MVP Restaurant Partners LLC, operator of the PDQ fast-casual chain, reported that a hacker accessed its computer system through a technology vendor’s “remote connection tool” and may have compromised an undisclosed quantity of payment card numbers, cardholder names, expiration dates, and verification values. The breach, which affected all but three …

While the opportunity to earn interchange on transactions made on its new Venmo debit card seemingly answers the oft-asked question of how PayPal Holdings Inc. plans to leverage its free peer-to-peer payment service, the full answer runs much deeper. Interchange is only one piece of the puzzle. A much larger …

With its Monday decision upholding American Express Co.’s anti-steering rules, the U.S. Supreme Court unleashed a tide of press speculation about just how payment card pricing, rewards, and network rules will be affected. At this point, however, only a few things are clear. The first is that AmEx chief executive …

Financial institutions providing banking services to cannabis businesses in states where marijuana has been legalized are no more at risk of being punished by federal regulators than they were before Congress last week rejected legislation to provide them safe harbor. Legislators in the House of Representatives and the Senate separately …

Bill.com announced that, at more than $52 billion, it has surpassed the $50-billion mark in bill payments processed annually for more than 3 million small-business clients. Prepaid specialist Incomm announced it is working with CheckFreePay Corp., a unit of Fiserv Inc., on a cash-based bill-payment service in store checkout lanes. …

Payments observers wondering when, and where, blockchain technology would take hold may want to pay close attention to cross-border remittances. Alipay Payment Services (HK) Ltd. said on Monday that it has launched a mobile-wallet based money-transfer service between Hong Kong and the Philippines using a blockchain backbone. The service, which …

In a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Monday that American Express Co.’s anti-steering rules for merchants do not violate federal antitrust law. The conservative majority’s decision, written by Justice Clarence Thomas, caps a case that dates back to 2010 and involves merchants who wanted to steer merchants to …

VyStar Credit Union joined the Cardtronics plc network, enabling its members to have fee-free access at more than 20,000 Cardtronics ATMs. ATM operator Prineta LLC said it is the new ATM vendor at the Renaissance Columbus Westerville-Polaris Hotel in Columbus, Ohio. Payments provider Worldnet TPS Ltd. said it has completed …

Payment volume through biller-direct Web sites continues to grow at the expense of bank bill-pay sites, according to new findings from Boston-based Aite Group LLC. Some 73% of the online bill payments made by consumers in 2016 went through biller-direct sites, up from 62% in 2010, according to Aite. Meanwhile, …

PayPal Holdings Inc. said it is buying Simility, a fraud-prevention and risk-management platform, for $120 million. Once the deal closes—expected in the third quarter—PayPal merchants will get access to Simility’s fraud tools, the company said. This is PayPal’s second acquisition announced this week. Wednesday PayPal said it was buying Hyperwallet for …

Canadian fintech Mobeewave could see its contactless-payment service for Samsung smart phones expand thanks to a new agreement with National Bank of Canada. And this week a British financial trade group announced that contactless payments in the United Kingdom jumped 97% in 2017. Dubbed National Bank Easy Pay, the service …

The mobile point-of-sale revolution is picking up momentum, despite having started nearly a decade ago with the first attachable card-reading devices for mobile phones. Projections from United Kingdom-based Juniper Research released this week indicate the installed base of mobile point-of-sale devices of all kinds worldwide—including integrated technology from major vendors—will …

PayPal Holdings Inc. blocked sales of the violent video game Active Shooter, which lets players choose the role of a gunman terrorizing a school or of a SWAT team trying to stop him, the Associated Press reported; the game had been pulled from the online marketplace Steam after complaints but …

Zelle’s gestation as a favored person-to-person payments service may be nearing fulfillment. A new survey from LendEDU finds that, nine months after its June 2017 debut, more consumers had become aware of the bank-backed service. In 2017, only 6.1% had heard of Zelle. By the time of the survey, that …