Bank technology

Banks are increasingly using mobile devices as an added layer of authentication for online banking, but messages sent to a phone can be intercepted. A security method developed in South Africa may close that security hole.

Ecommerce software company Rearden Commerce has raised $133 million in new funding from investors Citigroup Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co., and American Express Co.

Payments firm S1, jilted by Fundtech, needs to find a new merger partner to stay competitive and please shareholders. A long line of prospective suitors awaits.

Consumers are sharing more personal information online than ever — but they don't want to share it with banks. A few companies are trying to find a middle ground, helping consumers connect to lenders without exposing even basic contact information until absolutely necessary.

Australia and New Zealand Bank will implement Fundtech's Global CASHplus for cash management in 11 countries throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

American Express has purchased Sometrics, a company that facilitates payments within electronic games using virtual currency, in a deal worth $30 million, the company confirmed Tuesday.

Diebold claims its rival's single-slot ATMS, which mix cash and checks in a single deposit, are more prone to malfunction than Diebold's dual slot model. But the new NCR machines have won big deployment deals with Wells Fargo and BMO, and Wells has reported no problems.

Smaller banks have systems work to do, and a company called WebEquity is trying to fill in the niche. Upgrading to a unified system helps prevent inadvertent discrimination and stop making lending decisions based on excel spreadsheets.

Search giant now has both major card associations on board with its mobile payment application, as well as First Data and Citi.

At Sibos today, Microsoft announced an ISO standard message initiative it's been working on with Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citi and SWIFT.

Google Inc. may launch its much-hyped Google Wallet as early as this week, according to a number of reports.

The payments technology firm Fundtech can still expand but spend more on R&D and invest for the long term, an executive explains.

Dynamics announced a chip card that can re-write itself and hold two different accounts. The new product is a chip-based variation of Dynamics' rewritable magnetic-stripe card, which lets users select an account by pressing a button built into the plastic card.

Google Inc. will launch its mobile wallet with MasterCard Inc. and Citigroup Inc. in "a couple of weeks," MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga said, but he cautioned that Americans will not regularly pay with their phones for years to come.

To help banks sell card and other products effectively, a slew of vendors have come out with new transaction data analytics software.

S1 confirmed Friday that its planned merger with Fundtech has been terminated. But S1's board still does not want the company to be bought by ACI Worldwide, which has made repeated hostile bids for S1 in recent weeks.

Fiserv will begin personalizing chip payment cards based on the EMV standard. These cards feature a micro-processing chip that stores cardholder data more securely than magnetic stripes do.

If a merchant plans to use advanced data encryption as a credit card data security measure, the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council now has some guidelines for how best to go about it.

Offering Fiserv's software to read and enter check data so credit union tellers don't have to.

New malicious software comes out on an almost daily basis. Sun National's tech leaders discuss the software they use to tackle the problem.