The financial institutions whose online banking sites are doing the best job of protecting customers from identity fraud are Bank of America, Citibank, E*Trade Bank, Washington Mutual, and Wells Fargo Bank, according to a study released today. These banks scored in the top five of 28 institutions whose online banking …

Projected pilots in 2006 for contactless payment capability on mobile phones with near-field communication (NFC) technology will include high-throughput retail stores, in contrast to the self-contained environment of a sports stadium, where the first such trial began last week (Digital Transactions News, Dec. 14). Tom Zalewski, head of mobile payment …

A technology that allows consumers to use their debit cards and PINs to buy items on the Internet will likely undergo tests with at least one electronic funds transfer network starting the first half of 2006. A full commercial rollout involving at least one major merchant should be in progress …

In the debate between advocates of software-based authentication and backers of hardware devices, the former are winning, and this week's acquisition of Cyota Inc. by RSA Security Inc. proves it, says PassMark Security LLC. “To have the largest token provider in the world recognize no-hardware, two-factor authentication, it clearly endorses …

With identify fraud posing a serious challenge to online bankers and merchants, technology vendors are starting to respond with hardware- and software-based solutions offering so-called strong authentication, which adds a second factor of identity to the standard user-name/password pair. Now Corillian Corp. has launched a product it says is the …

A new guidance from federal banking regulators calling traditional user names and passwords “inadequate” for online banking could lead to a major push for strong authentication next year. The guidance, released last month by the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council, recommends what it calls multi-factor authentication, or identification systems involving …

Pay By Touch Solutions, which earlier this week said it will buy the assets of CardSystems Solutions Inc. for an undisclosed price (Digital Transactions News, Oct. 17), plans to rely on the Atlanta processor's links with some 27 independent sales organizations to help sell its biometric-payments product to tens of …

CyberSource Corp.'s deal to acquire the assets of CardSystems Inc. would hand the Mountain View, Calif.-based transaction-gateway provider a major sales channel for both card-present and Web-based payment processing, catapulting the company squarely into the ranks of processors for small and mid-sized multi-channel merchants, according to observers. The move also …

A major research firm's estimate this week that fraud losses on debit cards in the U.S. hit an estimated $2.75 billion for the 12 months ending in May might have struck a nerve, especially in the absence of hard data on the problem, but it also has experts raising questions …

The increase in thefts of personal and financial information from databases, highlighted by the recent security breach at payment processor CardSystems Solutions Inc., is causing other processing entities to enhance security efforts beyond just fortifying computers and telecommunications links. For instance, Vital Processing Services LLC, a big merchant processor based …