BANK tech-trends News
 

December 7, 2009 - December 11, 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

Micron Technology announced a new solid-state drive (SSD) that it described as the industry's fastest for notebook and desktop PCs with about 50% better data transfer speeds compared with today's best consumer-grade flash drives. Micron's RealSSD C300 drive is the first to utilize the SATA 3.0 specification, which offers 6Gbit/sec. throughput and the Open NAND Flash Interface (ONFI) 2.1 specification providing sequential read speeds of up to 355MB/sec. and sequential write speeds of up to 215MB/sec. All current SSD and most hard disk drives use the SATA 2.0, 3Gbit/sec. interface.

New servers from Dell, Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard and others are starting to hit the market with Intel's new Nehalem Xeon chips onboard. Intel's newest server processors represent a major architectural change from earlier Xeon generations. The addition of an onboard memory controller and Non-Uniform Memory Access (NUMA) help eliminate cache starvation by tying banks of RAM to each processor. Intel also redesigned the I/O system between CPU and peripherals, doing away with the front-side bus bottleneck and replacing it with a high-speed pathway called QPI (Quick Path Interconnect). QPI can transfer data to local peripherals as fast as 25.6GBps, nearly double the performance of a 1,600MHz front-side bus system. Other improvements include the reintegration of Hyper-Threading, the elimination of the Northbridge controller (PCI Express and Direct Media Interface are now in the CPU), and support for DDR3 memory.

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ATMs/Kiosks

Refurbished ATMs have been popular for some time, and are gaining popularity in the down economy. Now many organizations are starting to look at refurbished kiosks as well. The cost of a refurbished model can be anywhere from half that of a new one to 35 percent less, and those prices are based on the kiosk's age and condition, the type of equipment in the kiosk and the price of comparable new equipment. Refurbished kiosks that are purchased from a reputable reseller such as D2 Sales and Service often come with the same warranties as new units. Some organizations want refurbished units because they are looking to test the concept of using kiosks to deliver information, or they simply are on a tight budget.

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Voice is just one of many biometric identifiers that can be used for the purposes of identification and authentication in mobile banking and payments. For example, biometric security specialist Global Rainmakers is targeting financial institutions with its HBOX iris scanning system. The firm says that by the first quarter of 2010, they will have their technology deployed in mobile phones equipped with cameras to allow remote authentication.

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Mercatus, a financial services strategy consulting and investment firm, released survey results that show that mobile financial services are approaching a tipping point. Mercatus' analysis assessed consumer behavior across three decades of distribution channel innovation, revealing how the current pace of mobile adoption exceeds past innovations including ATMs, debit cards and online banking. The survey finds that nearly one-third of consumers are using, or considering using, mobile financial services in the next year. Additionally, responses indicate that consumer mobile financial service adoption will grow significantly during the next five years, exceeding the use of online banking by 2015. The six-month consumer research study survey, sponsored by Visa, concluded that financial institutions offering mobile financial services can increase new consumer acquisition by as much as sixty percent.

ClairMail announced a strategic partnership with Mitek Systems to integrate Mitek's Mobile Deposit application into its own mobile banking and payments platform. The firms say that Mitek's Mobile Deposit supports the payments industry standards for Remote Deposit Capture (RDC), and extends mobile deposit capabilities to millions of consumers who use cell phones equipped with a camera.

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Sourcefire has rolled out its first two IPS appliances for virtualized environments, as well as a new version of its 3D System intrusion prevention platform. The new VMware-based virtual appliances, Virtual 3D Sensor and Virtual Defense Center, can be monitored by physical or virtual management consoles and work with ESX and ESXi platforms. The virtual appliances can sit between virtual machines, between physical hosts and virtual machines, or between physical machines. Meanwhile, Sourcefire's new 3D System 4.9 release adds more than 24 IPS enhancements, including better network visibility, new dashboard customization, and policy-layering, where users can create and modify policies by geography, site, department, and user.

Webroot announced it has extended its cloud-based Web security service, adding a way to filter outbound as well as inbound Web traffic, monitoring for threats in order to detect and block malware such as botnets that have infected computers. The Web Security Service can now monitor for signs of malware-infected corporate computers trying to "call home" for more instructions, a common practice among criminally run botnets. If the cloud-based Webroot service detects malware such as botnet code calling out to get instructions or otherwise perform an activity, it will block that request, though not all traffic on the user's machine. The Webroot service would then notify the systems administrator of the security event via e-mail.

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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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A new report from Mercator Advisory Group states that working class, young and emerging consumers are fleeing financial institutions principally for two reasons: Economically dislocated consumers feel they cannot afford an overdraft-prone checking account and more vendors are creating fairly priced non-bank-centric products that are conveniently sold by major retailers. The research firm believes that this is troubling because the further disintermediation of middle-class/blue-collar workers undermines the rationale for branch/ATM networks and seriously compromises the Profit/Loss calculations for core banking services like call centers and IVRs. It is Mercator Advisory Group's position that banks can retain or regain these banking relationships if they stop defending overdraft fee income and rigorously focus on constructing transparent opt-in value-added fees, driving out operational inefficiencies through strategic partnerships and aggressively pursuing the distribution of innovative products and services through emerging channels. They conclude that we may well see the creation of a two tier banking structure with financial institutions competing against the most heavily trafficked and profitable retailers in America.

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Trusteer is reporting that while only a small number online bankers visit phishing sites each year (1.04 percent), about half of those victims (0.47 percent) divulge their login credentials to these fraudulent websites. Although there are a multitude of research findings and statistics on phishing attacks, information on how successful they are, how many users actually respond to them, and how many submit their login credentials or other personal information to criminal websites has been elusive. The Trusteer platform provides a unique view into the success and failure rates of phishing attacks via its Rapport plug-in, which is installed on approximately three million computers across North America and Europe.

eBillme, a secure payment option online that enables consumers to use online banking and bill pay services to make payments, announced a new revenue sharing program for banks. As part of this new program, eBillme will offer a revenue share for every eBillme transaction generated by the third party, which they say is an opportunity for banks to leverage their investment in online banking, expand their online bill pay offerings, and generate new revenue.

BankServ announced GFXWeb 2.3, a new browser-based system that banks can use to execute both real-time foreign exchange (FX) and domestic Fedwire payments. The vendor says that banks using GFXWeb 2.3 will realize greater precision in foreign exchange transactions as individual branches and customers gain the ability to request and receive real-time FX quotes, as well as the choice to accept or decline a quote before completing a payment. BankServ's software combines multi-factor and hard-token authentication, to create a secure funds transfer environment for remote access.

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XO Communications is rolling out an enterprise-class, multi-site Session Initiation Protocol trunking solution designed to add flexibility and scalability to distributed voice network architecture for a more centralized and cost effective VoIP solution. XO Enterprise SIP customers can use a centralized IP-PBX in one or a few primary locations to deliver VoIP services to other branch locations in the corporate WAN using XO's MPLS IP-VPN. Using SIP trunks can help customers reduce more expensive ISDN PRI or Digital T-1 voice trunks. XO offers pricing based on bandwidth and VoIP sessions instead of lines, and other VoIP service options include virtual telephone numbers for a presence in markets where the enterprise may not have a physical office (XO offers VoIP services in all 50 states and more than 2,700 cities); upgraded call compression technology; and business continuity options with Enterprise SIP trunk failover.

Hawk Communications, a national provider of Internet services with over 10 years of experience, has launched a new Web site, JoiBiz.biz, to focus on small- to medium-sized business communications. It features the following services:

- JoiBiz Hosted PBX which is a turnkey solution that includes multiple auto-attendants, call queue, conferencing and call bridge, real time queue display, call recording and monitoring, voicemail to e-mail and much more. It runs $49.95 per month plus 1 cent for incoming and 2 cents for outgoing calls.
- Business Class Internet Service which is a T1 line that comes with a guaranteed 99.99 percent uptime and 100 percent port speed. For small organizations, the JoiBiz service offers DSL service without the need to have a landline.
- JoiBiz Bundle offers a T1 line bundled with JoiPBX for $399 a month. Smaller customers can receive two business unlimited lines with 5MB DSL for $99 a month.d "virtual Steelhead for the cloud," this software can run on servers located at a public cloud computing facility.

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IP phone system maker Aastra has launched a new version of its Solidus eCare multi-media contact center solution. Solidus eCare offers intelligent skills-based routing, scales to support up to 10,000 agents and handles up to 400,000 calls per hour. Now the new version - Solidus eCare version 7.0 - offers InTouch, a new unified communications client offering advanced UC features and capabilities including “presence,” which is the ability to view the availability status of other users on the network. The revamped SIP-based solution also offers corporate directory searches and instant messaging by way of a single user interface. Aastra is also offering Solidus eCare Lite, a downscaled version of the solution designed for organizations with smaller contact centers (50 agents or less).

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