Near-Field Communication (NFC)

The NFC Forum, a global standards body for near-field communication technology, issued Release 15, which extends the range of certified compliant NFC contactless connections up to 2 centimeters, four times greater than the current standard 0.5 centimeters. Some 97% of decision-makers in the hospitality industry said they are confident about …

Ever since the card industry launched technology that lets merchants process transactions through an off-the-shelf mobile device, companies have worked to refine the idea further. Now, consumers can look forward to making remote purchases with a tap on their phone’s screen when they see something they want, according to payments …

Klarna AB has unveiled Klarna Card, a debit card offering the choice to pay immediately or later. The product incorporates the Visa Flexible Credential technology from Visa Inc. In other Visa news, the card network appointed Andrew Torre president of value-added services, replacing Antony Cahill, who has been appointed regional president and …

Visa Inc. is heralding a number of advances in payments technologies, among them the growth of digital-identity services related to payments, continued contactless-payments penetration, and progress with its Flex Credential. Visa said its efforts to create secure digital-identity technology, aimed at making the checkout more secure, is advancing. Central to …

Curve has launched Curve Pay on the iOS operating system for European consumers, becoming the first payments technology to use the iPhone’s NFC interface following Apple Inc.’s agreement with the European Commission to open that interface to competing services. U.S. Bank has issued a Visa debit card cobranded with Gonzaga University and aimed at …

With consumers and small-business owners long accustomed to mobile phones, Square is counting on that familiarity to make its new Square Handheld device an easier-to-use point-of-sale device. Calling Square Handheld, which is roughly the size of a smart phone though thicker, its most powerful and portable POS device ever, Square …

Some 41% of Americans think their finances will stay the same in the next 12 months, while 38% say their situation will get better, according to a survey by Discover Personal Loans, a unit of Discover Financial Services. But 20% expect to be worse off. The survey, conducted by Morning Consult, …

Samsung Electronics America announced early Tuesday it is rolling out a new peer-to-peer payments capability for its digital wallets in the United States. Called Tap to Transfer, the new feature will enable Samsung wallet users to send money to one another by tapping their phones. Samsung wallet users can send …

PayPal Holdings Inc. said it will work with TerraPay to let PayPal users make real-time money transfers throughout the Middle East and Africa. Cantaloupe Inc., a payments provider for self-service markets and vending, launched Go Micro, a compact kiosk for micro markets that features an integrated barcode scanner and 5-inch touchscreen. …

Block Inc. has been ordered to pay a $40-million fine to the state of New York for what the state’s regulator on Thursday called “significant failures in its Bank Secrecy Act/Anti-Money Laundering compliance program, which violated the [New York Department of Financial Services’ money transmitter and virtual currency regulations.”  The …