BANK tech-trends News
 

December 21, 2009 - December 25, 2009

• Hardware News
• Software Updates
• ATMs/Kiosks
• Biometric Digest Highlights
• Wireless World
• Security Section
• Leaders Roundtable
• Technology and Marketing
• Online Banking/E-Commerce/
  Website Design
• Internet Access
• Call Centers

Hardware News

Computer manufacturers have long touted all-in-one desktop PCs as space-saving wonders because they are not much bigger than a monitor. They are also a good bargain - typically selling for about one-third less than a standard desktop PC with a separate monitor. Plus they save on electricity because many of their parts have a laptop lineage. Some models use notebook-style external AC adapters, low-power processors, and downsized hard drives and DVD drives, all of which use less electricity than traditional desktop components. Here are four models that cost $600 or less that your bank may want to consider: the Acer Veriton Z280G, the Averatec D1133, the HP Pavilion MS214 and the MSI Wind Top AE1900.

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ATMs/Kiosks

A survey by Fifth Third Processing Solutions reveals that few financial institutions feel completely confident that their ATMs are fully protected from a security standpoint. Furthermore, an overwhelming number really did not know their internal practices for how often software or content is distributed to their ATMs. With ATMs taking on more functionality, it becomes even more important for ATM deployers to have a reliable method in place to distribute marketing content, software patches and new releases of ATM applications.

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Israel's Bank Leumi is introducing a password re-set feature for their online bankers that is operated by voice biometrics. The new system, supplied by Verint spin-off PerSay, enables online bankers to reset their e-banking passwords 24 hours a day. A PerSay spokesperson said "the "color of my cat" and "my wife's maiden name" are questions that belong to the past. Looking forward, we see more and more financial institutions and other service providers, adopting voice biometrics as an essential element in their security and risk management procedures."

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MasterCard Canada and Research In Motion, maker of the popular BlackBerry handsets, announced a four-month pilot in Canada in which BlackBerry users will attach contactless tags - chip-and-antenna tags with adhesive backing - to their handsets to turn them into contactless payment devices at 8,500 locations in Canada accepting MasterCard PayPass. The added twist on current contactless tags for mobile phones is that the user will get a confirmation e-mail of each transaction on their BlackBerry. Meanwhile, PayPal announced that its mobile Send Money application is now available for BlackBerry handsets. PayPal already offers similar applications for Apple's iPhone and handsets that use the Android operating system from Google.

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The Top Vulnerable Applications for IT 2009 report was just released by Bit9, and is based on the National Institute of Standards and Technology's database. Adobe's Acrobat, Flash Player, Reader, and Shockwave were at the top of the list, with vulnerabilities that were labeled as "high" by NIST. Also on the list of most vulnerable apps of the year are Apple Quicktime, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, RealPlayer, Sun Java, and Trillian. According to Bit9, the list encompasses applications that run on Windows, are frequently downloaded by individuals, and are not considered malicious by IT organizations or security vendors.

Some security experts argue that patch management and application whitelisting should be at the top of your security list because they can prevent many compromises. Vendors like Lumension, BigFix, and others sell enterprise patch management solutions designed to patch multiple operating systems and software from Microsoft, Adobe, Sun Java, etc. Of course, patch management does not protect against zero-day attacks, which is where whitelisting can help. It is advisable to look for a whitelisting solution that has the ability to detect and prevent memory corruption exploits and DLL injection. If not, then a whitelisted application could be running, get exploited, and continue to run but with malicious code injected into it while the whitelisting solution is unaware of the malicious changes.

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Core Systems:

Helping Banks Focus on Opportunities

Fidelity Information Services - http://www.fidelityinfoservices.com   Read Anthony Jabbour's comments:   http://www.banktt.com/roundtable/FIS.pdf

Fiserv - http://www.fiserv.com Read Fiserv's comments: http://www.banktt.com/roundtable/Fiserv.pdf

Fiserv - http://www.opensolutions.com Read David Mitchell's comments: http://www.banktt.com/roundtable/OSI.pdf

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According to the Aite Group, nearly half of all consumers belong to a financial services rewards program, with 70% of all credit cardholders owning at least one rewards-based card. Rewards card ownership increases consumers' credit card usage and purchase consideration, and even improves marketers' ability to target card holders. However Aite says that program profitability will continue to be a problem - only those that get it right will achieve monetary success with their offerings. "The profitability of debit card rewards programs varies widely depending on penetration rates, activation rates, program costs and increases in spending levels," says Ron Shevlin, senior analyst with Aite Group and author of the report. "Increased penetration, adoption and spending rates will be critical determinants of profitability for banks' loyalty programs."

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The United Kingdom's major banks have voted to stop clearing checks by October 2018, bringing to an end the 350 year old payment method. A review will be conducted in 2016 to determine whether sufficient progress in providing viable alternatives has been made to press ahead with the abolition by 2018. With checks costing around $1.50 to process, four times as much as electronic payments, the move could save financial institutions hundreds of millions a year. Major retailers and supermarkets in the UK are either phasing out or have already stopped taking checks.

In November, the Accel/Exchange electronic funds transfer network became the first EFT network to roll out online PIN debit to consumers. The network admits that so far volume has been modest, but says that the program is still in its early stages and that they plan to introduce permanent pricing for the transactions in the spring. The PaySecure solution allows consumers to use their Accel/Exchange debit cards, with their PINs, to make purchases with online merchants. PaySecure works by letting the consumer enter their PIN on a floating PIN pad, which is presented at checkout on their PC screen. The digits on this virtual PIN pad are rearranged after each entry, and the software also encrypts the PINs before passing them along to the network.

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ADTRAN, a provider of converged communications solutions, has introduced their NetVanta Unified Communications Solution Suite. These solutions offer voice mail, unified messaging, fax server and auto attendant, and also enable personalized UC for each individual employee. The NetVanta UC Solutions Suite includes NetVanta UC Server; NetVanta Business Communications System; NetVanta Enterprise Communications Server; and NetVanta Business Application Server, and can accommodate from five to over 2,000 users per server.

Akamai Technologies is introducing a cloud-based managed service called Web Application Firewall it claims will head off the bulk of Web applications attacks before they get inside organizations' datacenters. Akamai says the service is compliant with the wide-area file services (WAF) program specified in Payment Card Industry standards for Web application firewalls. They say that they can block the most common application exploits such as SQL injection and cross-site scripting, but admit that any attack that is not discoverable by a signature will not be stopped. Pricing for Web Application Firewall depends on how many applications customers want to protect and the size of their Internet connections.

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Broadcore, a provider of hosted unified communications services, announced the launch of Broadcore Call Center, a hosted solution for contact centers. The hosted solution features multi-location support and advanced disaster recovery capabilities. It provides integrated real-time status and presence for agents and supervisors in multiple locations. The system also supports virtual agents and helps supervisors to manage queues online with real-time dashboard and comprehensive statistical reports. The solution supports a variety of diverse voice endpoints such as standard session initiation protocol (SIP) telephones such as Cisco, Polycom, and Aastra phones, and also soft-phones, mobile phones, SIP-based analog adapters, and cordless phones.

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