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Optimal Payments has released a series of onboarding and developer options in an attempt to stay nimble amid the growing market of companies that use application programming interfaces (APIs) to offer transaction capabilities to retailers.

Nearly a decade ago, the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council told banks that passwords are not enough to guard financial data, and many companies scrambled to evaluate new and sometimes bizarre alternatives.

Heading into 2015, merchants weary from data breach fallout and worried about stricter PCI guidance will likely turn to third parties for payment security over a do-it-yourself approach.

Tangerine, Simple, American Express and Discover are some of the financial institutions that use Apple's Touch ID fingerprint-authentication technology to let consumers replace passwords or to add security.

In a breach incident that illustrates how long a company can do business without knowing fraudsters are potentially stealing its card data, Charge Anywhere LLC informed its merchants it has found and shut down malware that initially entered its network five years ago.

As card networks develop tokens to stand in for account numbers in online and mobile commerce, they may be able to standardize the experience across all companies that handle payments, said Mike Matan, head of global network business at American Express.

Rallying its members to wipe out passwords, the Faster IDentity Online Alliance — an organization of more than 150 payments and technology businesses — released standards Dec. 9 for multi-factor e-commerce authentication.

Companies seeking to shield valuable data from criminals and government spying should assume the attackers have already penetrated their systems and adjust defensive strategies, security firms McAfee and Symantec said.

Despite the many high-profile breaches that occurred over the past year, too many businesses have not adopted strong security practices and as many as a third don't have a clear understanding of where their sensitive data is stored or how it is protected.

Following the disclosure by a name brand retailer that their point-of-sale (POS) system had been breached, shoppers outside one of the retailer’s brick and mortar locations unanimously told a television reporter that cash was the safest way to pay in-person.