Information Architects Corp., a Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based provider of Web-based employee-screening technology, has announced it is entering the market for electronic point-of-sale transactions secured by cardholders' fingerprints. The company says it has acquired a U.S. patent (6,270,011 B1) that covers a fingerprint-scanning methodology for credit cards via scanners deployed at …

With chargeback rates running well in excess of 1% on Internet transactions, Visa International and MasterCard International have for some time been pushing a form of online cardholder authentication, called 3D Secure, that is intended to make cardholders, issuers, acquirers, and merchants feel confident that Web payments are legitimate. But …

With its new real-time check-verification and settlement product announced yesterday, Star Systems Inc. will be offering merchants and transaction processors a service that converts paper checks to electronic transactions just as retailers and financial institutions are preparing for the advent of check-imaging technology. Though Maitland, Fla.-based Star, the nation's largest …

A new technology that fights counterfeit card fraud by allowing a sort of “fingerprint” comparison routine based on magnetic stripes is getting its first commercial application with shipments having started within the past few weeks of card-personalization machines enabled with the technology. Kiran Gandhi, vice president for Carson, Calif.-based MagTek …

The news that Barclays PLC is talking to Providian Financial Corp. about buying the San Francisco-based credit card issuer has some observers speculating that the merger could accelerate the development of new electronic transaction products both in the U.S. and in Europe, where Barclays is a major card issuer with …

Digency Inc., an El Dorado Hills, Calif.-based third-party processing startup specializing in Internet payments, has begun processing transactions for a handful of merchants and now looks to execute an ambitious business plan that calls for the company to earn $13 million in fee revenue in 2004 from some 240 online …

The merger of banking powerhouses J.P Morgan Chase & Co. and Bank One Corp., announced late yesterday, would create the nation's second largest credit card issuer as measured by credit outstanding, the banks' chief executives said this morning in a meeting with analysts. The combined bank would boast 95 million …

Pay By Touch, a San Francisco-based company offering a biometrics-based technology that allows consumers to pay at the point of sale without presenting a card, keyfob, token, or any other payment medium, announced today that it has formed an alliance with IBM Corp. that should give the fledgling biometrics company …

Continental Airlines has announced it has now installed ticketing kiosks in all domestic airports served by its planes. With a machine going online Dec. 31 at the airport in Reno, Nev., the airline's network of machines now numbers 779 across 130 U.S. airports. Continental says self-service check-in has become the …

Hold the requiem for cash. It's still flexing its muscles as a payment vehicle, as witness the deal announced today by Western Union Financial Services Inc. and Continental Airlines. Starting now, customers who book seats on the airline's Web site can pay by cash at any of 45,000 Western Union …