Credit Cards

Hackers continue to improve malware, third-party vendors continue to serve their clients poorly when it comes to data security, and the evidence points to Russia as the single biggest source of attacks on databases. Those are some of the highlights in the new Global Security Report 2011 from Trustwave Holdings …

Cash: It’s still everywhere electronic payments want to be. Despite decades of gains by credit and debit cards, electronic commerce, the automated clearing house, and now mobile payments, cash is hanging on and will do so for many years, according to new findings from Aite Group LLC. Consumers spent $1.20 …

United Bank Card Inc., a big independent sales organization that touched off the so-called free-terminal trend seven years ago, has begun offering merchants full-blown point-of-sale business-management hardware and software at no charge. It is also offering its outside sales representatives a $300 commission per terminal sold. Many merchant-acquiring industry observers …

At first glance, a review of the data-breach scene in 2010 shows signs of improvement, or at least stabilization, according to figures from the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC). Although the total number of reported breaches increased to 662 from 498 in 2009, the number of records known to have …

Consumers brought holiday cheer back to merchants and payment processors in the run-up to Christmas this year, spending 5.5% more during the period than they did last year and giving signs that they are opening wallets and purses again after a long recession and rocky recovery. Especially noteworthy were sharp …

Credit cards will continue to dominate online payments for at least the next five years, but they will lose share to debit cards, alternative payments, and prepaid and gift cards, according to new projections from Javelin Strategy & Research. Javelin predicts in its “2010 Online Retail Payments Update and Forecast” …

It’s all over but the shouting, at least for now. France’s Ingenico S.A., which sells point-of-sale terminals in North America and elsewhere around the world, on Sunday rejected a suitor that had offered $1.9 billion for the company. Bloomberg had reported on Friday that the suitor was Danaher Corp., Washington, …

A major Federal Reserve payments study released last week grabbed headlines for documenting a dramatic three-year increase in electronic transactions, but a closer examination this week by officials who worked on the report highlights a number of subsidiary trends in such key areas as remote deposit capture, person-to-person payments, and …

Giving the bank card networks a taste of the medicine they’re getting in the U.S., Canada’s Competition Bureau on Wednesday took action against Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. rules against surcharging and honor-all-cards requirements intended to prevent discrimination by Canadian merchants against credit cardholders. “Visa and MasterCard’s anti-competitive behavior hurts …

Supporters of WikiLeaks attacked the Visa and MasterCard Web sites on Wednesday after the bank card networks cut off donation transactions to the controversial online anti-secrecy organization that recently disclosed hundreds of thousands of classified U.S. State Department cables. The attacks, which slowed down the networks’ Web sites or made …