As financial institutions move beyond mag-stripe payment cards, they face a crucial question: should we support mobile wallets, and if we do, should we also issue contactless cards? In the eyes of at least one observer, the answer is an unequivocal “yes” and “yes,” even though the former would seem …
Read More »A Fed Study Probes Payments Fraud and Security Vulnerabilities
The Federal Reserve announced Thursday that work began this month on a new study to measure fraud and associated costs to the U.S. payments system as well as identify fraud’s causes and contributing factors. After a competitive bidding process, the central bank hired Boston-based The Boston Consulting Group to do …
Read More »An Expert Predicts Gas Stations Will Fall Short of Meeting Their EMV Deadline
The U.S. petroleum industry has until October 2020 to comply with the card networks’ deadline to accept EMV chip cards. Will it make it? According to one expert observer, the odds aren’t good. “Some will not be ready,” Terry Mahoney, a partner who follows the industry at Chicago-based W. Capra …
Read More »Canadians Embrace Contactless Payments, but Are Cautious About Other New Payment Forms
Canadians are now quite comfortable with contactless payments, but they view other new payment forms cautiously, according to new findings from Visa Inc.’s Canadian unit. Some 52% of 1,000 adults polled in February for Toronto-based Visa Canada said they are regular users of contactless cards. Also, 80% of respondents said …
Read More »Visa Gets Set for the Next Big EMV Phase—Making Contactless Transactions Routine
With the EMV conversion mostly behind it, the United States is ripe for another big change at the point of sale—adoption of tap-and-go payments, says Visa Inc. With 96% of its payment volume now chip-based, “the next thing we’re focusing on is contactless,” Stephanie Ericksen, the card network’s vice president …
Read More »60% of Consumers Would Make a Voice-Commerce Purchase, a TSYS Survey Finds
A strong majority of consumers—60%—would use an intelligent personal assistant or voice-activated speaker to make a purchase or payment, finds the latest iteration of the TSYS U.S. Consumer Payment Study. The response is notable in because it was less than a year ago that another survey found only 19% of …
Read More »Eye on E-Commerce Fraud: CyberSource And Worldpay Harness Machine Learning And Big Data
Machine learning and huge swaths of data are being enlisted in the battle to counter online fraud, with CyberSource announcing an enhancement to its fraud-prevention service and processor Worldpay Inc. launching a new fraud-prevention service Wednesday at MRC 2018, the annual conference held by the Merchant Risk Council. CyberSource, a …
Read More »Orbitz Breach Exposes Risks to Partners, and the Vulnerabilities of Older Technology
Another day, another data breach. But each one has lessons for the payments industry, and that includes the breach disclosed Tuesday by online travel-services provider Expedia Inc.’s Orbitz subsidiary. Hackers accessed one of Orbitz’s older systems and thereby may have exposed 880,000 payment card numbers on file, according to press …
Read More »E-Commerce Fraud Losses Increased 7% Across 2016 And 2017, Says Signifyd
E-commerce fraud over a two-year period through the end of 2017 increased 7% across all merchant categories, finds the Ecommerce Fraud Index released Tuesday by fraud-prevention specialist Signifyd Inc. The index reported the level of total fraud losses increased from 3.8% of sales volume in 2016 to 4.09% in 2017. …
Read More »Omnichannel Vital for Retailers, But Payments Improvements Rank Low in 2018, NRF Finds
As more consumers opt to shop using mobile devices, more retailers are looking at ways to unify the checkout experience, according to the “State of Retailing Online 2018” report released this week by Shop.org, the digital arm of the National Retail Federation. Completed in conjunction with Cambridge, Mass.-based Forrester Research …
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