Technology

United Parcel Service Inc. said a breach of computer security at some of its UPS Store retail outlets may have exposed customers’ personal and payment data this year.

Evolution is occurring rapidly in mobile payments. While the innovation headlines are being made by the digital innovators and new industry entrants, banks still have a window of opportunity to take strategic advantage and preserve their traditional payments franchise.

Almare Gelato Italiano accepts many alternative payment methods, and hasn't paid a dime for them because its vendors want a taste of the foot traffic at store's prime location in downtown Berkeley, Calif.

VeriFone is targeting a wide range of markets for its taxi and merchant applications. The company has reached an agreement with Bharti Airtel Group in Africa and, separately, entered taxi payment deals in Turkey and Mexico.

Square won't require users of its $99 Square Stand to replace their hardware when they are ready to accept EMV-chip cards. Instead, the vendor will support EMV cards through the hardware's included USB hub.

Payza, a payment processor and digital wallet provider based in London, has released a tool that allows its merchant clients to accept payments from shoppers who have not previously enrolled with Payza.

Riskified is halving its fees for its Shop Protection service, which guarantees against chargebacks but requires merchants to let Riskified fully control which sales go through and which get blocked.

The Backoff malware, which targets point of sale systems and has hit hundreds of businesses, may catalyze adoption of EMV "chip and PIN" cards and two-factor authentication as merchants look for ways to soften the impact of the next attack.

SumUp is preparing to bring its mobile point of sale device to a number of new countries, and hopes its practice of developing its technology in-house will help it contain the costs of chip and PIN card payments.

Braintree and PayPal are testing an integrated mobile payments feature, delivering on the company's promise to integrate technology from Braintree's Venmo unit.