Transaction Processing

Cybercriminals have introduced a new version of a notorious malware threat that is not only harder to detect but also more capable of stealing card numbers, PINs, and other sensitive information. This latest variant of the so-called Zeus Trojan malware includes a change that makes it virtually invisible to programs …

A recent survey of financial institutions and service providers shows that while attempted takeovers of financial accounts by computer hackers and thieves increased last year, the percentage of successful takeovers dropped. Meanwhile, PayPal Inc. announced a program to pay security researchers for finding flaws in its system. In its second …

Check 21 saved the U.S. payments system more than $3 billion in 2010 as paper check clearing gave way almost entirely to image clearing, according to a paper released recently by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. The paper sets out what is believed to be the first effort at …

A little software company gone bust won big against leading point-of-sale terminal maker VeriFone Systems Inc. in a patent-infringement verdict June 8. A federal jury in Texas found after a five-day trial that VeriFone infringed on two patents held by CardSoft Inc. and awarded damages and royalties of $15.4 million. …

The hackers who broke into merchant processor Global Payments Inc.’s computer systems added a new chapter to the disreputable history of data breaches by gaining access to information from applicants for merchant accounts, the company disclosed late Tuesday. Global’s revelation apparently is the first publicly known incidence of merchant-applicant information …

Driven by fast growth in “native payments” that dispense entirely with paper checks, total automated clearing house network volume increased 4.4% in the first quarter over the year-earlier period, the ACH network’s highest quarterly increase since 2008’s fourth quarter. Michael Herd, managing director of network rules at ACH governing body …

Marketing revenue from mobile payments has the potential to dwarf payments revenue, as pundits have been saying for some time, but that potential will never be realized unless a new sort of payment network is built, argues a new report. Existing networks like Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc., not to …

The Penn Station East Coast Subs submarine-sandwich restaurant chain says 59 of its 238 locations are now “potentially affected” by a debit and credit card data breach. Parent company Penn Station Inc. first said when it disclosed the breach June 1 that 43 franchisee-owned stores possibly were affected, but the …

Visa Inc. has been saying for months that the Durbin Amendment’s transaction-routing and network-exclusivity rules, which took effect April 1, would take a bite out of its debit business. Gash might be a better word for the amendment’s initial effects, especially on the Visa-owned Interlink PIN-debit network. The No. 1 …

High-end department-store chain Nordstrom Inc., which has been testing some 6,000 mobile devices for customer service and checkout, expects to roll out a significantly larger number of the devices in the first quarter of next year and to add as much capability to them as it has on its cash …