John Quain reports for the New York Times about how banks are enabling their customers to use their cell phones for basic banking functions.

Arcot is holding a seminar in New York on Wednesday, June 6, titled "Taking the eFraud Out of eBanking - Preventing Identity Fraud in Financial Services".

Helen Mirza writes an article titled "Gift Cards – Facts and Cautions Regarding a Widely Used Financial Product" (PDF) for the May 2007 issue of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's Profitwise News and View periodical.

Canadian Tire and MasterCard Canada have announced that all of Canadian Tire Retail's 468 stores will be ready to accept MasterCard chip cards by the end of 2008. Canadian Tire is setting up its software, point-of-sale systems, and retail processes to be chip-ready as MasterCard issuers gear up to introduce chip cards across the Canadian market.

Update: See Jim Bruene's report on the first Mobile Commerce Summit.

Crone Consulting,LLC, American Banker and CardTechnology have announced a Mobile Commerce Summit to be June 18-19, at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, NV.

The Federal Reserve Board has issued for public comment proposed amendments to Regulation Z (Truth in Lending) that are intended to improve the effectiveness of the disclosures consumers receive in connection with credit card accounts and other revolving credit plans by ensuring that information is provided in a timely manner and in a form that is readily understandable.

Metavante yesterday filed an S-4 Registration Statement with the SEC as part of the previously announced plan to separate Marshall & Ilsley’s banking business and Metavante’s business into two separate, publicly-traded companies.

American Express has announced that its cardholders will be able to pay monthly home mortgage payments on its cards. Amex said that "American Home Mortgage Corp. will be the first lender to offer this Express Rewards Mortgage program for eligible prime loans." The program also provides Amex's Membership Rewards, cash back, airline or hotel points or other types of rewards affiliated with their card for the mortgage payments. Cardholders must pay a one-time fee of $395 to the lender for enrollment in the Express Rewards Mortgage program at the time of mortgage closing.

NOVA Information Systems has announced a data security compliance program to help "Level 4" merchants comply with the Payment Card Industry Data security Standard (PCI DSS). According to the PCI DSS, Level 4 merchants are defined by processing fewer than 20,000 e-commerce transactions and/or fewer than 1 million Visa or MasterCard transactions annually. NOVA currently processes for more than 850,000 merchants in North America, most of which meet the Level 4 criteria.

• Union Bank of California Extends Its Check Fraud Detection Capabilities
• First Data Secures Major Processing Contract with Samba Financial Group
• NetDeposit Structures Organization to Better Serve Growing Electronic Payments Market
• Ruesch International and Payment Alliance International Announce a Business Relationship to Deliver International Payment Solutions to Financial Institutions and Business Clients
• TSYS(R) to Offer Austin Logistics' Collection Treatment Optimization Solution