Bank technology

In order for the financial services industry to achieve its full potential in the digital age, Silicon Valley must work together with banks and lawmakers to build technology that can modernize banking infrastructure while addressing regulatory and cybersecurity challenges.

A recap of the informed opinions (and the discussions they generated) on BankThink this week, including recommended reforms to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and Ripple Labs' efforts to work toward a decentralized payments protocol.

Claims of security lapses at LifeLock and Experian call into question the value of these companies' identity theft protection services, which many banks offer to their customers.

American Banker readers share their views on the most pressing banking topics of the week. Comments are excerpted from reader response sections of AmericanBanker.com articles and from our social media platforms.

Wells Fargo tapped the head of its wholesale services unit to lead a new research and development division.

Visa Inc. shares surged 7.5 percent after the world's biggest payments network said it expects to complete discussions over a potential deal to acquire Visa Europe Ltd. by the end of October.

Mobile-first banking startups not only help partner institutions acquire deposit accounts. They also function as quasi-R&D units, teaching bankers about areas like design and coding.

Ellie Mae will add new integrations of Fannie Mae's automated loan review technology to its loan origination system to help lenders ensure loans remain eligible for sale throughout the underwriting process and eliminate surprises at the end.

Connecting disparate payment platforms is the Holy Grail of cryptocurrencies. The path to building such a system is not always clear, but must start at the core of the protocol.

Capital One Financial Corp., the credit-card lender that grew into a diversified bank, hired former PayPal executive Don Kingsborough to help run a division that makes strategic investments in technology startups.

New York State's interim bank superintendent is asking pointed questions of a new instant messaging service. The outcome of the inquiry could broadly affect the way vendors work with regulators.

Buyout heavyweight Accel-KKR just bought a stake in Banker's Toolbox, a software company that helps community banks flag fraud. The PE firm says it was on the hunt for investments in the compliance space given the regulatory climate.

The acting head of New York's financial regulator has asked for details on the instant-messaging service that several large banks are developing, out of the concern that many of the same banks are under investigation for rate-rigging.

Nobody enjoys the experience of making a payment — so a growing number of companies are likely to follow Uber's lead and make transactions so easy they're practically invisible. That means banks will have to ramp up their efforts to become customers' default cards.

Identity theft protection company LifeLock is coming under fire from the Federal Trade Commission for failing to adequately protect customers' credit card and bank account data, Social Security numbers and other sensitive personal information, among other allegations.

Law enforcement authorities arrested four people in Israel and Florida and revealed a complex securities fraud scheme tied to the computer hacks of JPMorgan Chase & Co. and other financial institutions.

They're not ready to go all-in by putting core processing in the cloud, but community banks are experimenting with hybrid and quasi-cloud arrangements that offer low costs and rapid deployment.

First Data is looking to sell shares of its stock to address its "indebtedness," the company announced Monday.

Radius Bank's partnership with online investment firm Aspiration highlights a nascent trend among small banks in the race to win millennial customers: partnering with fintech firms rather than opening branches.

Ashley Madison, an online extramarital dating service that claims to protect users' privacy and security, has had its customer database compromised.