The AP reports that the House has passed legislation today that would "prevent gamblers from using credit cards to bet online and could block access to gambling Web sites." Reps. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., and Jim Leach, R-Iowa sponsored the bill.

Mobile coupon service Cellfire has announced that it has secured $10 million in Series B funding led by Menlo Ventures. Cellfire is a free downloadable application that provides coupons from a local and national retailers within the user's geographic region.

MasterCard Worldwide, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, MTA New York City Transit and Citi Cards and Citibank have announced the beginning of a six-month contactless payment trial in select New York City subway stations with pre-selected Citi credit card and Citibank customers.

Khoi Vinh, Design Director for NYTimes.com, blogs about his desire to consolidate all of the various stored value cards in his wallet into a single card - saying "I'm no financial engineer, obviously; I’m just a guy who wants a lighter wallet. Consolidating stored value cards is one possible solution — I’m not going to hold my breath for it."

Rock on! Elvis Presley Enterprises and EDP Licensing, Inc. have announced the launch of the first Elvis Presley Prepaid Visa card. According to the website, the card is issued by First Premier Bank.

Matt Marshall writes for the San Jose Mercury News' SiliconBeat blog about PayMate, an India-based startup focusing on enabling mobile payments that has recently received venture financing. According to Marshall, "the investment continues the partnership formed by Google founding investor Ram Shriram and one of Silicon Valley's best-known venture firms, Kleiner Perkins."

Canopy Financial has announced HealthScore, a new credit score intended to be used specifically for predicting and managing the unique risks associated with lending to consumers with high-deductible health plans.

TSYS has announced the acquisition of Card Tech, Ltd., a privately owned London-based payments firm that has implemented its payments software for six of the 25 largest global banks and three of the largest global card issuers. Worldwide, the company has approximately 190 clients from 70 countries -- primarily banks. Its applications are certified by all of the major global payment networks. The all-cash transaction closed on 11 July 2006. The new company will be known as TSYS Card Tech.

Michal Lev-Ram writes for Business 2.0 about mobile commerce - saying its time has finally come. In the article, Lev-Ram looks at BillMonk, PayPal Mobile, Obopay, TextPayMe, and MyTango. According to Dan Schatt, a senior analyst at Celent, "The stars are finally aligning. This will happen a lot faster than most people realize."

Marshall Loeb writes for MarketWatch about debit card reward programs from Washington Mutual, North Fork Bank, Chase, and Citibank.

Reuters reports that a "bipartisan bill aimed at closing a loophole that allows retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to own industrial loan companies (ILC) was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives on Monday. Sponsors Paul Gillmor, an Ohio Republican, and Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat, said their legislation would restore the traditional separation between banking and commerce." A copy of the proposed legislation (PDF) is available online.

• Silicon.com: Crime of the future - biometric spoofing? - Be careful where you leave your fingerprints
  
• Richard Stiennon's Blog: Phishing is a problem for banks to solve
  
• PayPal to Open Technology Center in Scottsdale; New PayPal Facility Currently Accepting Applications for Hundreds of Technical Positions
  
• Consumerism Commentary blog: Thinking About Moving Savings From ING Direct to HSBC Direct?
  
• IBC Bank Launches New Online Corporate Banking Services Powered by Corillian
  
• PaySquare and China UnionPay Sign Exclusive Contract
  
• Old National Bank (USA) Uses VASCO's Digipass 260 for Corporate Banking
  
• Financial Express (India): Adopt best data protection norms: Visa tells merchants