BusinessWeek's series on the increasing use of credit cards by students continues this week with an article titled "The Dirty Secret of Campus Credit Cards". The article says that credit cards issued under affinity contracts represent sweetheart deals between the card issues and the colleges - and that "it's the students who pay the price."

Marilyn Alva writes for Investor's Business Daily about Verifone and how it's benefiting from wireless POS equipment sales in support of expansion of card acceptance into new segments such as taxis in New York City.

In a press release yesterday, the Smart Card Alliance weighed in on plans by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and several states including Arizona, Vermont and Washington, to develop and issue enhanced state driver's licenses that could be used as acceptable alternative documents for crossing the United States' land and sea borders. The Smart Card Alliance says it "has serious privacy and security concerns for U.S. citizens participating in these programs based on the direction DHS has been recommending for the enhanced driver's license technology."   » Continue Reading

In an article titled 'Did Radio (Waves) Kill The Biometric Star?", Evan Schuman writes on his Storefront Backtalk blog about how "contactless payment and mobile payment efforts seem to have stunted the growth of retail biometrics." He notes that "the surprisingly rapid acceptance of contactless payment credit cards essentially usurped the speed/convenience argument away from the biometric people."

JCB has announced the launch of the Breeze Center JCB Card with the J/Speedycontactless payment program in alliance with Union Bank of Taiwan (Union Bank). According to JCB, "this will be the first card with J/Speedy in the world. J/Speedy allows customers to pay quickly and easily by simply tapping the card - no signature is required."   » Continue Reading

Celent has announced a new report titled "Best Practices in RDC: The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Deployers" - saying that "differences among banks are stark, with highly effective deployers enjoying a hundred-fold advantage in the number of RDC clients deployed."   » Continue Reading

The Hindu reports from Bangalore on Airtel's launch of mChek's mobile payment service - enabling Airtel subscribers to pay their mobile phone bills via SMS using mChek.

• UK: HSBC cash machines give out overdraft warnings
• St. Louis Post-Dispatch: First National St. Louis is among first banks to offer tap-and-go debit cards