Thursday , December 12, 2024

Kevin Woodward

Kevin's role at Digital Transactions is to write news and features stories for publication on the Web site and in the magazine. He also oversees the digital editorial aspect of the site and the Digital Transactions News daily newsletter.

Eye on Biometrics: Amazon One Adds Age Verification; WeChat Adds Palm Payments

Amazon.com Inc. is adding another feature to its Amazon One palm-based identity service, and Chinese site WeChat has brought palm recognition to cameras used for facial recognition. Amazon One has added an age-verification component, Amazon said in a blog post. Launched in 2020, the technology recently expanded beyond Amazon properties …

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Eye on Restaurants: SpotOn Releases New POS Hardware; Shift4 Launches SkyTab Contest

In the hotly competitive restaurant point-of-sale market, acquirers are constantly devising new products and enticements to attract these merchants. To that end, SpotOn Transact LLC said Monday it has released three new point-of-sale devices for restaurants, and Shift4 Payments Inc. has enlisted hospitality expert Jon Taffer in a contest. Announced …

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Lower Interchange Deal Struck in Canada

Small businesses in Canada will reap lower interchange rates in that country, the Department of Finance Canada announced Thursday. The deal suggests a similar reduction is possible in the United States, the Merchant Payments Coalition quickly responded. Both Mastercard Inc. and Visa Inc. agreed to lower the domestic consumer credit …

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Sezzle Makes Room for Pay-in-2 BNPL Product

Sezzle is fine-tuning the buy now, pay later experience with the debut of its Pay-in-2 product. Just as its name suggests, the new product splits transactions into two payments, which can help expand BNPL to new categories, such as grocery, monthly subscriptions, and other high-frequency categories, Sezzle says. Consumers choosing …

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28% of the Rising Volume of Phishing Attacks Target the Financial Sector

It’s a laurel, of sorts, that financial firms would like to rebuff. They sustained the largest share of phishing attacks in the fourth quarter, accounting for 27.7% of all attacks, followed by the broad “other” category at 18.2%, and webmail, software-as-a-service at 17.7%. That’s according to the Phishing Activity Trends …

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Block Nears $5 Billion in Revenue

Buoyed by Cash App, services, and a move up market Block Inc., parent of Square and Afterpay, generated nearly $5 billion in first-quarter revenue, a 25% increase from $4 billion in the same quarter a year ago. Its transaction-based revenue of $1.42 billion was a 15% increase from $1.29 billion …

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Western Union Views Visa+ as Complement

The Western Union Co. says its decision to join the early set of providers in Visa Inc.’s interoperable peer-to-peer payments service called Visa+ reflects its business. Visa+ allows users to move payments between rival peer-to-peer payments networks. The pilot, set to launch later this year, will begin with transfers between …

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Fiserv’s Merchant Business Leads First Quarter Growth

Giant processor Fiserv Inc. said its revenue from its merchant business increased to $1.85 billion in the first quarter, a 12.1% increase from $1.65 billion a year ago. Brookfield, Wis.-based Fiserv said its two other segments—financial technology and payments and networks—also had revenue increases. Revenue for the financial technology business …

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Cards in a Real-Time Payments World

As a new phase of real-time payments in the United States draws near, don’t expect payment cards to go away any time soon. That’s the consensus from several speakers at the Smarter Faster Payments 2023 conference sponsored by Nacha this week in Las Vegas. Each time a new payment rail …

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The FedNow Real Time Payments Marathon Is About to Begin

If The Clearing House Payments Co. LLC’s experience with the formation and setup of its Real Time Payments network more than five years ago is any indication, the upcoming FedNow service may want to prepare for a marathon. That’s the advice from Keith Gray, TCH vice president of sales and …

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