With ransomware attacks showing no signs of slowing down, the National Cybersecurity Alliance and the PCI Security Standards Council issued a joint warning bulletin Thursday. The bulletin was prompted by feedback from payment industry stakeholders and heightened news coverage of the attacks throughout 2021, says the PCI SSC.  In 2021, …

In a bid to make it easier for consumers to pay myriad credit card bills each month, a startup called Fyncr Inc. on Thursday launched a bill-payment app that allows users to aggregate and pay their credit card bills in one application.  With the Fyncr app, credit card holders can …

As part of its strategy to enable application developers to create solutions fully compliant with open-banking regulations around the world, Cloudentity, a provider authorization technology, has joined the Google Cloud Partner Advantage program as a technology partner to Apigee, Google Cloud’s API Management platform. The partnership combines Apigee’s API management platform with Cloudentity’s …

Apple Inc. rattled the payments industry on Tuesday with its announcement of technology that will let merchants accept card and Apple Pay transactions directly on an off-the-shelf iPhone with no attachments, but rivals say they’re taking the news in stride. “We’ll feel some impact, we’ll feel it a little bit, …

As banks pull ATMs from underperforming off-premise locations, it is creating an opportunity for independent ATM deployers to fill the void, says a report for RBR, a London-based research and consulting firm. The trend, which is being driven in part by banks’ growing emphasis on providing cashless paymentsolutions to their …

After years of trailing fintechs such as Square Inc. when it comes to merchant satisfaction with payment processing, big banks find themselves atop the leader board, according to J.D. Power’s 2022 U.S. Merchant Services Satisfaction Study.  Bank of America Merchant Services leads the way, posting a satisfaction score of 894 …

As all payments companies know, some active accounts are more active than others. On Tuesday, PayPal Holdings Inc.’s top executives made it plain the company’s 2022 priority is to emphasize—and pour money into promoting—accountholder activity. “The shift is, we’re not going to throw marketing dollars at low-value customers coming in,” …

Five months after announcing its deal to acquire buy now, pay later provider Afterpay Ltd., Block Inc. is making Afterpay available to Square sellers in the United States and Australia. The move comes as Block, Square’s parent company, officially closed the Afterpay acquisition on Monday. Block agreed to buy Afterpay …

Silvergate Capital Corp. late Monday confirmed widespread reports that it has acquired assets from the stablecoin venture Diem Group. The deal, valued at $182 million in cash and stock, includes Diem’s intellectual property and “other technology assets related to running a blockchain-based payment network,” according to the announcement. The La …

Governments are moving closer to issuing digital money. That could introduce some benefits—but also many risks and complications. Central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) are coming, slowly but inevitably. They can be retail (for use by consumers and businesses), wholesale (for use between financial institutions), or both. Evangelists enthuse they’ll improve …