The principals of a leading software developer and its independent sales organization partner in the card-processing application market for Apple Inc.’s iPhone have bought a key rival, a move they say will enable them to thrive in a fast-changing market that is attracting heavyweight competitors. Inner Fence LLC and Dublin, …
Read More »Heartland, MasterCard Forge a $41 Million Data-Breach Settlement
Continuing its massive clean-up in the wake of the payment card industry’s biggest data breach, merchant acquirer Heartland Payment Systems Inc. late on Wednesday announced a $41.4 million settlement with MasterCard Inc. The settlement will reimburse MasterCard debit and credit card issuers for their costs stemming from the breach Heartland …
Read More »An iPhone Accessory Heats up the Push for NFC on Memory Cards
With the announcement on Monday by DeviceFidelity Inc. that it has developed a case for Apple Inc.’s iPhone that will let the popular smart phone accept a memory card, the payments industry took what some observers consider a key step toward the commercialization of near-field communication (NFC), the interactive technology …
Read More »Questions Arise in the Wake of Durbin’s Winning Amendment
Payments-industry partisans of all stripes got onto their soap boxes on Friday and Monday to praise or denounce U.S. Sen. Richard Durbin’s successful amendment that could pave the way for regulation of debit card interchange and acceptance terms. Merchant interests basked in the surprisingly large (64-33) victory they scored late …
Read More »Interchange Rules Close in as Senate Okays Debit Card Amendment
Interchange regulation is one step closer to reality after the U.S. Senate late on Thursday approved an amendment that would require the Federal Reserve to determine “reasonable and proportional” transaction fees for debit cards. Banks earn an estimated $15 billion annually from debit card interchange fees. The Senate approved the …
Read More »Visa’s Big PIN-Debit Rate Hike Further Closes Gap with Signature Debit
The gap in acceptance costs between PIN-based and signature debit, once wide, continues to narrow, payments executives say. The trend is most apparent in the new interchange schedules for Visa Inc.’s Interlink electronic funds transfer network and the signature-based Visa check card. A number of Interlink rates are rising by …
Read More »ProPay Takes Early Lead in Extending Data Protection to the ACH
With processors, banks, and merchants across the country buttoning down credit and debit card data to keep them out of criminal hands, processors are starting to turn their attention to the information they and their client merchants collect from automated clearing house transactions. ProPay Inc., a Lehi, Utah-based merchant processor …
Read More »PCI Council Consolidates PIN-Entry Standards into One Set of Rules
The PCI Security Standards Council on Wednesday released updated guidelines governing PIN-entry devices that incorporate all the rules into a single set of requirements. Previously, there were three separate sets of requirements for point-of-sale PIN entry devices (PED), encrypting PIN pads (EPP), and unattended payment terminals (UPT). Version 3.0 of …
Read More »Experts Challenge Payments Execs to Get Ready for Social Media
Banks, merchants, and others scratching their heads over the exploding popularity of social networking and its close cousin, social gaming, can harness the online phenomenon for payments but will likely have to jettison decades of settled thinking, experts say. Banks, in particular, will have to wrestle with knotty problems surrounding …
Read More »PINless Debit, Card Acceptance for Consumers from Obopay
Online PINless debit transactions could get a boost if a package of four new mobile-payments services from Obopay Inc. proves to be a hit. Dubbed Mobile Money for Banks, Obopay’s new white-label service has another interesting twist besides PINless debit in that it will enable consumers to accept payment cards. …
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