Four computers containing Social Security and bank-account numbers for an estimated 2,200 individuals have been stolen from a California office of merchant processor Heartland Payment Systems Inc.’s payroll-processing division, Heartland reported Monday. Also on Monday the PCI Security Standards Council updated its rules governing payment card software. And in other …

Google Inc. is betting its latest mobile payments incarnation—Android Pay—will work better than Google Wallet did. Announced Thursday at Google I/O, its developer conference, Android Pay is poised to compete directly against Apple Inc.’s Apple Pay, PayPal Inc., and the upcoming Samsung Pay for a piece of the burgeoning mobile-payments …

Discover Financial Services disclosed Thursday that it will enhance its company-wide anti-money laundering procedures under an agreement it signed with the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. The agreement does not call for fines. The pact follows by 11 months a consent order that Discover’s Delaware-based bank subsidiary, Discover Bank, struck …

The U.S. Postal Service could generate as much as $1.1 billion in additional annual revenue after five years if it expanded its existing payment services. That’s according to a report from the USPS Office of Inspector General. But a hotly competitive market could dampen those prospects, experts say. Struggling with …

A proposed $19 million settlement forged by MasterCard Inc. and retailer Target Corp. to compensate MasterCard issuers for fraud and other expenses they incurred after Target’s 2013 data breach failed to win approval from issuers representing 90% of eligible accounts that the so-called alternative-recovery plan needed by a May 20 …

Electronic commerce hit a milestone in the first quarter by accounting for 7% of total retail sales for the first time, the U.S. Commerce Department’s Census Bureau reported Friday. Preliminary estimates from the Census Bureau pegged seasonally adjusted retail sales at $1.15 trillion, with e-commerce totaling $80.3 billion. In 2014’s …

By Jim Daly Global Payments Inc., the biggest processor swept up in the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s April lawsuit against allegedly fraudulent debt collectors, came out with guns blazing Thursday in its first response to the CFPB’s complaint. “The CFPB’s attempt to hold Global [Payments] responsible for the actions of …

By Paul Schaus Considering new regulations on general-purpose prepaid cards, is it worth it for banks to still be in the business? The answer is: Maybe not. If banks have enough customers who are underbanked or unbanked, as well people just on a tight budget clamoring for prepaid cards, prepaid …

By John Stewart Experts in merchant acquiring have long pointed out that, when it comes to revenue, size matters. Now there are numbers measuring just how much it matters. Acquirers processing the most annual volume, some $30 billion or more each, earned revenue at a rate of 41 basis points …

By Jim Daly Processors accused by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau last month of aiding allegedly fraudulent debt collectors by providing them with payments services are beginning to file their answers to the federal charges. At least one of them is accusing the CFPB of “regulatory overreach” in the style …