As Apple Pay’s global user base climbs to an estimated 127 million individuals, a mystery about why even more consumers don’t use Apple Inc.’s mobile-payment service confounds one researcher. Loup Ventures, a Minneapolis-based venture-capital firm, on Thursday released its annual Apple Pay review. Among its findings is that the estimated …

Visa Inc. launched Token Management Service, a service it says will make it easier for users to manage tokenized payment card data from multiple sources and across multiple channels, the card network announced Thursday. Designed to complement the Visa Token Service, the new program provides a way for merchants to use …

A new guide from the U.S. Payments Forum outlines the considerations for selecting a mobile-wallet program and draws upon lessons from past successful and unsuccessful mobile wallets launches. In its white paper, “Mobile and Digital Wallets: U.S. Landscape and Strategic Considerations for Merchants and Financial Institutions,” the Princeton Junction, N.J.-based …

Shift4 Payments LLC has made another acquisition. The acquiring player behind the Harbortouch brand purchased Melville, N.Y.-based CurvePay, which was backed by IRN Payment Systems, Shift4 announced Tuesday. Terms were not disclosed. It was only two weeks ago that Allentown, Pa.-based Shift4 Payments finalized acquisitions for three hospitality point-of-sale providers, …

Stolen identity information obtained by several Russian defendants named in Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller’s indictment, released last week, was used to create fraudulent PayPal Holdings Inc. accounts. The defendants were named in connection with alleged activities surrounding the 2016 presidential election. The indictment provides details about an alleged conspiracy …

A new point-of-sale software malware strain wants its victims to think it is a nondescript bit of code that computers and networks commonly use when surfing the Internet. Uncovered by investigators at Austin, Texas-based Forcepoint, a data-security services provider, the malware, dubbed “UDPos” by Forcepoint, attempts to conceal itself in …

Currencycloud, an international payments platform based in the United Kingdom, has hired a U.S. general manager in a push to capture more cross-border payments volume from U.S. merchants. Currencycloud announced Richard Arundel as the general manager of Currencycloud North America. Arundel, a co-founder of Currencycloud, spent the past two years …

Convenience-store operator Cumberland Farms Inc. updated its SmartPay Check-Link mobile app with biometric authentication and the ability to enroll in the program within the app, the Westborough, Mass.-based company announced Monday. The app, which launched in 2013, gives users a 10-cent discount per gallon of gas when they use it …

The stock market may have tumbled this week, but cryptocurrencies are enjoying a generalized comeback. All of the 10 largest currencies by market capitalization are up since early in the week, with third-ranked Ripple’s XRP token surging 20% just since late Thursday to lead the pack, according to Coinmarketcap.com. It …

A July 1 PCI Security Standards Council deadline is prompting payments providers to act well before then, with many establishing their own compliance deadlines in February. What has provoked this eagerness? It could be that noncompliance with the PCI mandate could halt merchant transactions that rely on the Internet. The …