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Welcome to the new PaymentsSource Morning Briefing, delivered daily. The information you need to start your day, including top headlines from PaymentsSource and around the Web:
Bad news at Arby's: More than 355,000 credit and debit cards may have been breached because of malware at point of sale terminals at Arby's, reports security writer Brian Krebs. In a statement to USA Today, Arby's said it is investigating its payment system, and has notified law enforcement officials. It's also removed the malware from compromised IT systems that power the payment terminals. The malware allowed attackers to steal data from credit cards at the time of the swipe, Krebs reported. The attack type is similar to the scheme used at Home Depot and Target, which suffered large breaches a few years ago. Those breaches drew more attention to EMV cards, which were still an early concept in the U.S. at the time, though it's unclear if chip card technology would have prevented the type of attack that's believed to be behind the breaches at Arby's, Home Depot, Target and other big box retailers.
An employee demonstrates Samsung Electronics Co.'s Samsung Pay application on a Galaxy Note 7 smartphone with stylus during a media event in Seoul, South Korea, on Thursday, Aug. 11, 2016. Samsung's large-screen Galaxy Note 7 smartphone can be unlocked with an iris-scanning camera. Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg
SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg
Samsung Pay debuts in Thailand: As Samsung Pay tries to take advantage of India's changing cash policy to build a new market, it's also making moves elsewhere in the continent. The third-party mobile payment app has formally launched in Thailand, according to Android Community. The site reports there was an early access release to a small group of users, and the app is launching with partners including Siam Commercial Bank, KTC, KCC, KasikornBank, Bangkok Bank, Citi, Visa and Mastercard. Samsung Pay is now available in South Korea, the U.S., Spain, China, Singapore, Australia, Puerto Rico and Brazil, and has made other recent moves such as introducing a Samsung Pay Mini app for non Samsung Android Phones.
What's missing in Montreal: Montreal has been a hotbed of financial and payment innovation, from BMO's aggressive moves into mobile payments to the metro system's use of payment incentives to get people to ride at non-peak hours. But EY reports the city is missing a way to inform consumers and the local technology community about its potential as a global tech center. EY is recommending the city centralize its development community through networking, collaborations with local universities, mentorship programs and opening an innovation hub to bring stakeholders together. It's a strategy that has worked well for other cities around the world, including Toronto, where the MaRS district has attracted both local and international payment and fintech innovators.
Friends in high places: Payment companies have long struggled with how to embed transactions in wearables, which hold huge potential, but also hide pitfalls. There's also some question as to how popular wearable technology will be as some companies that provide the underlying technology struggle to find footing. But there are major signs of life. First, word got out this week that Android is using payments as a way to market its new smartwatches. And on Thursday evening, TechCrunch reported Warren Buffett is putting his firm's money behind wearable technology. Berkshire Hathaway's Richline Group plans to launch a set of wearables later this year, including jewelry and other accessories. The wearables will use Bluetooth to connect to mobile apps. There's not a lot of detail available beyond that, though "connected" jewerly has already shown some promise as a payment device.
Cash payments at retail stores near pre-note ban levels The Economic Times of India • Writankar Mukherjee Cash payments at hypermarket chain Spencer’s have increased from 11 per cent of overall sales in November to 25 per cent in December, and 37 per cent now.
How Local Businesses Can Benefit From Mobile Apps Business 2 Community • Jamil Velji Many small and local businesses are finally realizing that to stay competitive today, you need to venture into the world of mobile apps and marketing. Having a mobile-friendly website is not the only way to stay ahead of the competition. There are...
Brits to spend £27 billion using mobile devices in 2017 Mobile News • Manny Pham Online shoppers will account for 40.1 percent of transactions, 27.9 per cent of it will be from mobile devices British shoppers are predicted to spend £27 billion using mobile devices in 2017, an increase of 26 percent from £21.51 billion.
More from PaymentsSource
In the Internet of Things, is a payments 'hub' better than a product? ModoPayments is fresh off a string of new customer implementations with COIN, its payment "hub" approach for merchants and banks, and it's already looking ahead to bigger prospects with the emerging Internet of Things (IoT).
Retailers must contend with lingering payment security fears Online commerce is massive business these days, but precisely for that reason, there remains a portion of the buying public that's both careful about their personal data and cagey about shopping from independent online retailers.
Mobile is becoming a nexus of fraud: Report Mobile is taking the spotlight as fraudsters shift to account takeovers and e-commerce fraud in the wake of EMV chip cards taking hold at the physical point of sale.
Scattered Spider, a cybercrime gang whose targets include banks, has seen five of its members arrested for SIM-swapping and phishing schemes that stole millions.
A federal appeals court granted the government's request to pause a ruling that briefly restored Democratic National Credit Union Administration board members Todd Harper and Tanya Otsuka, leaving the regulator with a single board member pending appeal.
Erik Porter will succeed Lisa Oliver as president and CEO of the Cooperative Bank of Cape Cod; Gary Hall and Sobani Warner are named co-presidents of Siebert Williams Shank; Faiz Ahmad and Mike Joo will lead Bank of America's global investment banking unit; and more in this week's banking news roundup.
Bank of Glen Burnie, which is seeking to recover from a stretch when its assets declined, hopes that its deal for a residential lender can help boost loan production.
Small practices are still mired in paper. Fiserv has joined banks such as JPMorganChase and Citizens in applying new third party transaction technology to the tricky sector.
