Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals
Merchants and financial institutions will find their information-protection practices under intense scrutiny this week in Washington, where no fewer than four Senate and House of Representatives hearings are scheduled in the wake of payment card data breaches at Target Corp., Neiman Marcus Group and other merchants. The sessions kick off …
Read More »Visa Sticks to EMV Deadline; CEO Decries Data-Breach Blame Game and ‘Misinformation’
Visa Inc. chief executive Charles Scharf on Thursday quelled rumors that the payment network might change its October 2015 liability-shift deadline for Europay-MasterCard-Visa chip card transactions. Scharf also decried what he called “misinformation” and “confusion” about card security following December’s news of Target Corp.’s huge payment card data breach and …
Read More »Mitek Pictures Itself as a New Tech Provider in Mobile Biller-Direct Payments
Mobile-imaging software developer Mitek Systems Inc. on Wednesday announced its Mobile Photo Payments application that enables large billers to receive bill payments from consumers using their mobile devices. The service complements San Diego-based Mitek’s existing Mobile Photo Bill Pay product, which rolled out last year and is distributed mainly through …
Read More »Michaels Reports ‘Potential Issue’ Involving Apparent Payment Card Data Breach
Seemingly confirming predictions from law enforcement and data-security executives in private industry that more data breaches beyond the recent ones at Target Corp. and Neiman Marcus Group are coming, arts-and-crafts retailer Michaels Stores on Saturday warned that “we may have experienced a data-security attack.” Plano, Texas-based Michaels alerted consumers to …
Read More »New T-Mobile Prepaid Card Presents Opportunities and Risks for Blackhawk Network
It’s best known for its Gift Card Mall displays of retailer gift cards and other prepaid cards in grocery stores, but prepaid card services provider Blackhawk Network Holdings Inc. is a force in general-purpose reloadable (GPR) prepaid cards. It had a GPR business even before 2010, when it launched its …
Read More »Mobile Devices Capture the Lion’s Share of Consumer Remote Deposit Capture Users
A new research report from Celent LLC estimates that the number of consumers using the mobile variant of remote deposit capture (RDC) nearly doubled in 2013 and predicts that users will triple by 2016 to 61 million. Along with documenting its growth, however, the report says remote capture is sustaining …
Read More »Experts Differ on Whether EMV Chip Cards Provide Data-Breach Immunity
The huge data breach at Target Corp. and now one at upscale department store Neiman Marcus Group and possibly other retailers has introduced many Americans to the term “EMV” and the possibility that more secure Europay-MasterCard-Visa chip cards will replace vulnerable magnetic-stripe credit and debit cards in the United States. …
Read More »Eye on Transit: A New Fare System for D.C.; New York Ponders a MetroCard Successor
America’s mass-transit systems in early 2014 are continuing their migration away from proprietary fare systems and toward so-called open-fare systems that can accept general-purpose payment cards as well as mobile payments. This week, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority, locally known as Metro, awarded a $184 million, 8-year contract to …
Read More »With Marijuana Sales Now Legal in Colorado, Will the Smoke Clear on Pot Payments?
The smoke seemed to clear a bit this week on the status of electronic payments for Colorado shops selling now-legal recreational marijuana, but the nascent merchant category still remains in what effectively is a legal no man’s land between conflicting state and federal laws. Some 20 states and the District …
Read More »Research Group Picks Judge’s Overturning of Fed’s Durbin Rule as 2013’s Top Payments Event
We couldn’t recruit David Letterman to help us with this article, but what follows are the Top 10 U.S. payments events of 2013 as identified by the Retail Payments Risk Forum, a research and industry-dialogue unit at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. 10. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau finalized …
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