Authentication

Banks' core systems are like spaghetti — a mess of noodles. They need to find ways to be more structured,, says Hanspeter Wolf, CEO of onboarding software vendor Appway.

Authentication methods meant to keep cybercriminals from taking over accounts can also lock out legitimate users. This old dilemma is growing more vexing as cybercriminals get better at impersonating customers and as regulators increasingly push multifactor authentication.

Bank regulators will stiffen their requirements and identity theft will escalate, but banks will toughen up their defenses.

Relations between banks and providers of personal financial management tools have soured of late amid reports that some banks block PFM sites' access to their customers' information during peak traffic periods. Aggregators say they are working to address banks' concerns, but they also are urging banks to invest in more server capacity to keep pace with customer demand.

Moven will soon prompt its customers for usernames and passwords only for riskier transactions. By removing the login for most functions, the company aims to drive engagement in an app meant to be used on the go.

Ramamurthi has transformed a 123-year-old institution with one branch serving a dusty Kansas town into a seedbed for disruptive financial technology — not to mention a wildly profitable generator of fee income.

Under the direction of Richard Holbrook, Eastern Bank has prepared itself for the next 200 years by embracing a culture innovation, adding scale through acquisitions and advocating for the less fortunate in its community. It's an unusual formula, but it has worked and that's why he is one of American Banker's three Community Bankers of the Year for 2015.

Branches using technology to issue cards on the spot leads to increased card usage, so banks should aim to maintain instant issuing capability with the EMV conversion.

The debate over whether signatures or PINs are a stronger security feature overlooks the fact that neither is the most important defense against fraud.

With the outlook for mobile payments improving, American Express has brought together several initiatives in this area under a new umbrella dubbed Amex Enabled Digital Solution.

Forward-thinking companies could get a reputation lift from being first out of the gate with interesting apps. Banks could also be first to help protect customers from the inevitable privacy leaks that the IoT will make possible.

U.S. Bank recently updated its mobile app to a system that would allow it to react more quickly to new technology. It's going to need that flexibility now that consumers are complaining about missing features in the latest upgrade.

To identify fintech startups deserving of special recognition this year as part of the FinTech Forward program, a team of American Banker editors, BAI staff and industry members debated the merits of self-nominees and companies we know.

The collaboration between financial institutions and technology firms runs deep, but banks' recent criticism of lax regulatory oversight for nonbanks reveals fissures.

The quest for secure, yet really quick and easy enrollment and login for bank accounts, has evaded banks for years, and it’s become more important than ever.

First Internet Bank is pioneering eye-vein recognition to let customers log in to its mobile app, hoping consumers' distinct concerns about this form of biometric authentication fade away.

Banks need to take a hard look at the age-old practice of using signatures to authenticate card payments, Federal Reserve Gov. Jerome Powell said Thursday.

Applying early for the web extension increases the odds of getting a preferred address in a business where "First National" is as common as "John Smith." Eventually, bankers hope .bank gains widespread recognition as a mark of trustworthiness.

Most banks that deploy voice authentication require a specific spoken passphrase. Eastern Bank customers can have a normal conversation with call center reps; software in the background compares their voice patterns to a recorded snippet.

In the second part of a two-part conversation with American Banker, miiCard's James Varga discusses how his company leverages the trust placed in banks to create "digital passports" for consumers to prove their identities without oversharing information.