Wendy Pollack writes for The Informed Reader at the Wall St. Journal Online reports that in Iraq "at least one bank, the Trade Bank of Iraq, has begun offering credit cards — so far, it has issued 15,000 of them."

Shift4 Corporation has announced new technology for current and legacy point-of-sale (POS) systems that, when used with Shift4's $$$ ON THE NET(r) gateway, removes all useable personal credit card data at the POS terminal, in back-office data storage and during all data transport.

Reuters India reports that "electronic transactions in India are set to double in the next three years with the Reserve Bank of India, the banking system, aggregators and merchants pulling out all stops to promote it."

Tim Landis reports for the Springfield, Illinois Journal Register about a local restaurant's data breach resulting in reissuance of a number of debit cards. The comments at the bottom of the story reflect some of the consumer frustrations associated with this kind of event.

American Express has announced that IndyMac Bank, the nation’s second largest independent mortgage lender, will be among the first to offer this Express Rewards Mortgage program to borrowers seeking eligible prime loans.

Card Technology reports on comments by Bank of America's John Suchanec regarding the bank's recent trial of contactless mobile phone-based payments - saying the results "failed to inspire".

Lending Club, a Sunnyvale, California-based startup, has launched a new person-to-person lending service on the social networking service FaceBook. From the company's web site: "Lending Club is an online lending community where people can borrow and lend money, bypass the banks, and get better rates. By working together, members can borrow money more easily and at a better rate than they would get from a bank, or invest in a pool of loans at higher rates than those served by savings accounts or CDs." Lending Club is using the recently introduced Facebook Platform for integration into Facebook. Read more on the Lending Club blog.

Consumer Action has announced the release of its 2007 Credit Card Survey (PDF) - saying it reveals new details about a range of credit card industry practices.

The law firm of Perkins Coie reports on the more than 100 class action lawsuits that have been filed in federal court since December 2006 against a broad spectrum of retailers alleging violations of the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act ("FACTA") of 2003 (15 U.S.C. § 1681 et seq.). "The suits allege these companies "willfully" violated FACTA by generating electronic customer credit or debit card receipts containing prohibited information, and seek awards of what some courts have described as "annihilating" statutory damages in the $100 million to $1 billion range, plus punitive damages and attorneys’ fees."

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