Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. have been tokenizing their payment cards since 2014, but have not been able to access tokens for cards branded by the other network. That will change soon as the result of an agreement announced separately Thursday by Visa and MasterCard. Under the agreement, Visa will be able …

Nearly two-thirds of U.S. adults now carry a general-purpose credit card, and credit cards are gaining popularity with young adults, according to new consumer survey findings from Mercator Advisory Group Inc. The Maynard, Mass.-based research and consulting firm reported this week that 63% of U.S. consumers have a major-brand credit …

• In a study of more than 900,000 merchants, processor First Data Corp. says retail spending from Thanksgiving through CyberMonday (Nov. 28) grew 5.8% from year-earlier levels; brick-and-mortar retailers saw spending grow 4.1% while e-commerce spending jumped 14.3%. • European software firm Comtrade Digital Services has built an automated banking platform for the Viber messaging app, …

The ever-expanding Internet of Things could represent a back-to-the-future security nightmare for the payments industry. What’s a network without endpoints? Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. have big networks—about 8 million endpoints in the form of merchant locations that include point-of-sale terminals in the U.S. alone. But the Internet of Things, …

The new year will be ringing in with questions about Visa’s plan to improve the data-security work that third parties do on small merchants’ point-of-sale systems. What happens when a payment-security requirement isn’t enforced and is largely ignored by vast numbers of the industry participants it covers? We’re about to …

Our cover story this month describes the security issues surrounding the so-called Internet of Things. That’s the increasingly intricate network of devices using the Internet to control everything from garage doors to thermostat settings. In many cases, payments flow over this IoT, and therein lies the problem. As our story …

By John Stewart @DTPaymentNews Stripe Inc.’s latest funding round, in which the privately held San Francisco-based company nearly doubled its valuation to $9.2 billion, shows what startups can do if they’re innovating in the right sector of payments, experts say. Just six years old, Stripe provides tools for payments online …

• Credit cards were implicated in 59% of all fraudulent online transactions for the period stretching from Black Friday through Cyber Monday, up from 49% for the same period last year and from 44% in 2014, according to data from iovation, a device-authentication company. Still, fraudulent traffic overall for the period …

• Processor Jack Henry & Associates Inc. will resell the Zelle person-to-person payments service to its financial-institution clients under a new agreement with Zelle’s owner, Early Warning Services LLC. • Affirm Inc., whose technology allows consumers to pay over time for online purchases, said it is now integrated with four new e-commerce …

• The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania issued final approval of a $37.5 million settlement in a class-action case, Reyes v. Zions First National Bank, attorneys for the class announced. In the case, plaintiffs alleged Zions Bank and a former payment-processing subsidiary knowingly handled payments for fraudulent …