Bank technology

The Defense Department is offering a year of credit monitoring to the nearly 5 million people affected by a data breach in September.

Banking and payments executives try desperately to figure out where their debit card strategies all went wrong – and what, if anything, they can do next – at an industry conference.

Promontory Interfinancial Network LLC will integrate its Insured Cash Sweep and Certificate of Deposit Account Registry Service with Fiserv Inc.'s Premier bank platform.

PayPal Inc., a pioneer in alternative online payments, is now seeking to stake a new claim in the burgeoning and increasingly congested mobile payments space — and what sets it apart may be a three-year-old acquisition.

A glimpse of what may represent the future of payments has arrived, but thus far only in certain geographic areas. With the Card Case smartphone application from Square Inc., consumers pay simply by stating their names at the point of sale.

The mobile wallet providers Google Inc. and Isis continue to position their products as more than just payments vehicles to replace plastic cards.

AmeriFirst is turning to technology to bring servicing operations in-house while achieving the same cost efficiencies that traditionally have been achieved via subservicing arrangements.

Executives at a payments industry conference took some jabs at the regulations slashing their long-cherished debit card interchange fees.

Jeff Dennes, chief digital officer at Huntington, says the bank will quickly evolve its new iPad app, which is the first from a regional bank in the App Store.

Gemalto is offering a new product that secures online banking transactions using a combination of a smart card, secure browser and Adobe reader technology.

MasterCard is short on details for plans to beef up share in the debit card space on its third-quarter earnings call with analysts. The network posted strong earnings and revenue gains despite a sluggish economy.

Bank technology provider Fiserv has positioned itself for a wave of growth in electronic payments. It expects its recently purchased CashEdge and related business lines to balloon in the coming years.

While saving money and paying debts can be its own reward, Bank of the West is taking the added step of offering potential prizes to consumers who reduce outstanding credit or boost savings.

Banks and financial institutions have been sitting on vast amounts of customer transaction data for several decades now. The hardware and software technologies to make sense of this vast storehouse of data have been available for at least a decade now. Meanwhile the appetite for insightful data to help marketers target customers online has grown enormously, as has users' disdain for untargeted advertising.

Citing steady international growth and earnings from increased debit network fees, First Data delivered a 3.8% increase in third-quarter consolidated revenue.

Jack Henry & Associates said its first-quarter net income for its fiscal year 2012 rose 15% to $36.5 million from a year earlier, lifted by growth in support and service revenue.

Both VeriFone and Ingenico are enhancing their point of sale terminals to accommodate future growth in near-field communication and global chip and PIN payment security standards, a move that should move alternative payment forms forward.

Fiserv said Tuesday its third-quarter revenue rose 3% to $1.06 billion from a year earlier due to revenue growth in its payments segment. Its net income fell 5% to $127 million from a year earlier.

The prepaid card marketer NetSpend is teaming up with PayPal in a deal that has so far been the subject of little fanfare by either company.

Bank of America is running television ads depicting a son telling the story of how family loyalty to the bank is based on his parents approaching their local B of A branch manager some 71 years ago to finance selling hot dogs from their stand on a local corner. The piece notes that the parents offered no collateral but gained the confidence of the local manager of their potential success. This story is consistent with the history of the bank going back to its founder, A.P. Giannini who consistently worked to meet the needs of small businesses in developing areas and during difficult times.