Bank technology

Rurban Financial Corp. in Defiance, Ohio, has revised its 2011 earnings after the abrupt bankruptcy of a key client wound up wiping out much of the company's fourth-quarter profits.

In a time of crisis, banks are challenged to communicate to irate and frustrated customers over Twitter, Facebook and blogs. And in most cases, the banks don't win.

Bank of America has launched Trade Pro, an electronic platform for companies to manage trade and financial supply chain operations.

Citigroup Inc. has reached a long-term agreement to provide credit services for the retailer coalition BrandSource.

Rather than pitch his new digital wallet only to banks, iCache founder Jon Ramaci is offering his product, the Geode, on the crowd-funding website Kickstarter.com, a site not typically associated with banking technology.

Like MasterCard, Discover's new roadmap to EMV card payments in the U.S. relies on heavier security protocols, which Visa says aren't needed in a market dominated by online processing.

Crooks have figured out a way to illegally obtain mobile phone SIM cards, causing a headache for the contactless payments market.

But the deal has not received support from Misys' largest shareholder, which is contemplating a rival offer.

Transaction Network Services said Monday that it is launching a mobile payment gateway service for its customers.

BillMyParents announced Monday that it will soon be talking directly to its prepaid card users over the Web through a deal with RespondQ.

As Chris Larsen steps aside as Prosper's CEO, the company — and the rest of the peer-to-peer lending industry Larsen helped create — has the opportunity to change its course and possibly even merge with one of the very banks it originally sought to displace.

VSoft announced Monday that Texas Trust Credit Union has agreed to use the vendor's remote deposit capture technology for its branch offices, online banking and automated teller machines.

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Critics say branches are expensive and losing customers, but bankers this week rallied in defense of their brick-and-mortar locations, even as they acknowledged that branches are losing some ground to mobile and online banking.

Microsoft-sponsored IDC research projects that cloud computing will create 14 million jobs worldwide by 2015. Yet an earlier Gartner study projects a loss of skilled jobs due to cloud-related technology. Who's right?

"The time when everybody and their dog could start a prepaid card company is coming to an end" and prepaid companies need to step up their use of technology to keep their customers, says Plastyc CEO Patrice Peyret.

Phishers turn the tables and mobile payments still scare consumers in the big security stories of the week through March 15.

The San Francisco online loan facilitator has named Dawn Lepore its interim chief executive. Larsen remains the chairman.

By using regularly updated profiles and business rules, the bank tailors new marketing campaigns on a daily basis. It's now working on a system that will provide near-real-time marketing based on current transactions.

Mobile payments are a hard sell, even for the dominant online alternative payment provider. PayPal's approach may seem like overkill, but the company says every payment counts when trying to convince consumers and small merchants to use handheld devices.