Ingenico and iMobile3 have announced a strategic partnership which will power the launch of Ingenico's new Mobile Retail Platform -- iMRP -- in the United States.

"Combining Ingenico's industry leading secure payment solutions with iMobile3's cutting-edge mobile products and professional development services allows us to create powerful mobile commerce solutions for merchants and consumers alike," said Thierry Denis, President of Ingenico North America. "Merchants are continuously seeking new ways to connect and interact with their loyal consumers, and consumers are looking for unique experiences with their preferred brands. "

Billeo has announced its Active eWallet API, "a tool that allows card issuers to add their cards as a payment option in Billeo's Active Context platform.

By adding a credit, debit, prepaid or gift card to Billeo's platform, the issuer is instantly connected to the more than 1.5 million consumers who use Billeo's free iPad and browser apps to shop or pay bills online.

FICO has released its analysis of data showing that major shifts have occurred in European card fraud patterns.

Analysis done on 55 million active credit cards represented in the FICO Falcon Fraud Consortium for Europe showed that counterfeit fraud fell 60% between March 2009 and March 2011. FICO's data also shows that card-not-present fraud accounted for 69% of all accounts victimized by fraud and 72% of all fraud losses.

Experian and American Express have announced a partnership to offer international payment processing and foreign exchange services to Experian’s UK clients.

The partnership adds a global payment processing capability to Experian’s existing range of services, which already includes international bank account validation and domestic payment processing. A direct link to American Express’s Foreign Exchange International Payments product will be included within the Experian Payments Gateway, the most widely used Bacstel-IP service available in the UK.

On the web:

• Invasion of the Star-Studded Debit Cards - WSJ
• Bank of America, Citigroup Face Billions In Losses in (Interchange) Antitrust Case - TheStreet
• Spanish Banks Prepare Barcelona and Madrid for Mobile Payments - NFC World

On the wires:

• Valve Rewards Outstanding GlobalCollect Service with Contract Renewal
• Twenty Colleges Choose Heartland Payment Systems for Financial Aid Disbursement Services
• Eastern Mountain Sports Blazes New Trails with VeriFone iPad Retailing Solution
• Ingenico and Voltage Security Partner on End-to-End Encyrption
• NCR Launches its Highest Performing POS Terminal to Date

Over on Payments Views, our sister site, Glenbrook's Russ Jones blogs about Verizon's $2.00 bill payment convenience fee, and asks whether the whole exercise was crazy... or not.

There are three broad things that most billers care about — presentment method, payment channel, and payment method. Not all billers have the same goals and objectives, but I would argue that all billers frame their ‘funds collection’ strategy along these lines.

On the web:

• AmEx and eBay Belly Up to the Barcode - American Banker
• Apriva Wallet Enters Mobile Payments Arena - Vending Times
• Near Field Communication — the Next Mobile Boost? - CNBC
• Thief Drops Stolen Coin Collection into Coinstar Machine - KPTV Channel 12

On the wires:

• AsiaPay launches PayDollar Debit Payment for APAC region
• Suze Orman Launches "The Approved Card" Prepaid MasterCard

Visa and Better ATM Services have announced the ability to dispense Visa Gift cards in addition to cash at existing ATMs.

With this introduction, ATM menu screens now include a “Purchase Visa Gift Card” option and prompt to designate the value to load on each card. Cards are available with no activation fee in $25 denominations during the pilot. The new ATM-dispensed Visa Gift card is made of a durable yet thinner material, which allows cards to easily pass through the cash mechanisms of ATMs.

An in-market pilot program is currently underway offering Visa Gift cards at walk-up and drive-through ATMs in select locations throughout Arizona.

Intuit has announced that it plans to take its free GoPayment mobile credit card app and card reader hardware global, with the first implementation in Canada. In addition, Intuit will soon begin shipping a free, newly-designed GoPayment Card Reader in both the U.S. and Canada.

This innovative card reader is a compact, cylinder-shaped device that helps maximize sales with new features that increase the accuracy of each card swipe. Providing greater security than available on other devices, it includes best-in-class, end-to-end encryption that protects a customer’s sensitive credit card data from the moment a card is swiped.

GoPayment for Canada and the new GoPayment card reader will both be available in early 2012.

ControlScan has released the results of a study it recently completed with acquirers on Level 4 Merchant PCI Compliance.

94% percent of acquirers have a PCI program in place for their Level 4 merchants with 57% saying their merchants see value in their PCI program. More importantly, 70% of acquirer respondents believe their PCI program reduces small merchant data breaches.

The survey was completed in October 2011 by 146 banks, processors and ISOs with Level 4 merchant portfolios ranging from less than 1,000 accounts to more than 50,000.

ThreatMetrix has announced that it has acquired the Australian-based company TrustDefender, a "recognized leader of secure browsing technology to stop man-in-the-browser (MitB) attacks and provide malware protection." The combined companies will operate under the ThreatMetrix name with global operations in the United States, Australia and Europe. The corporate headquarters will be located in San Jose, California.

Secure Vault Payments announced it has added Regions Financial Corporation to the Secure Vault Payments (SVP) Network. Regions will offer the online payment option to customers in 16 states across the South, Midwest and Texas.

“Merchants and consumers alike are increasingly seeking convenient and secure online payment options, particularly for large dollar transactions,” said James Hicks, head of Treasury Services for Regions Financial. “Regions’ participation in Secure Vault Payments will allow us to provide additional payment choices and benefits to our customers.”

Secure Vault Payments is the only online payment method that links consumers directly to their bank account without a middleman. Secure Vault was developed by NACHA — The Electronic Payments Association and eWise, a provider of online and mobile payment solutions.

First Data has released its First Data SpendTrend analysis for the full month of December 2011 compared to December 2010.

Dollar volume growth on cards overall was a healthy 6.9% in December. However, strong auto sales, driven by low interest rates, likely diverted consumer spending to car sales from other retail areas. Auto sales are not captured in SpendTrend figures. Overall year-over-year average tickets declined 0.1% in December, the first negative reading since January 2011. Merchants resorted to steep discounting to spur holiday traffic. Consumers responded favorably to bargain pricing, as overall transaction growth was up 7.0% in December.

SpendTrend tracks same-store consumer spending by credit, signature debit, PIN debit, EBT cards and checks at U.S. merchant locations.

Visa Inc and Visa Europe have jointly announced that NFC-enabled smartphones from Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics and Research In Motion (RIM) have been certified for use with Visa’s mobile application for payments at the point-of-sale, Visa payWave.

“This is an important step for Visa, its financial institution partners and the mobile industry,” said Bill Gajda, Global Head of Mobile Product, Visa Inc. “In addition to issuing plastic magnetic stripe or chip-enabled payment cards, financial institutions can now consider offering their accountholders a way to transform their smartphones into fully functional mobile payment devices.”

On the web:

• Hefty Profit Seen for Card Issuers - WSJ.com
• Kount Offers Free Device Fingerprinting to New Customers - Internet Retailer
• PayPal Partners With POS Software Company AJB To Scale In-Store Payments Option To Big Box Retailers - TechCrunch
• Intel at CES 2012: Future Ultrabooks to Sport NFC - Digital Trends

On the wires:

• TSYS Signs Payment Services Agreement with Pivotal Payments
• Tabbedout Launches Beta Offers Feature for Austin Consumers
• BluePay, a Provider of Merchant Processing Services, Offers New Plugin for QuickBooks Point of Sale

Various media outlets are reporting, and now PayPal has confirmed, that Home Depot is the first brick-and-mortar retailer to roll out a limited pilot of the some of the products that PayPal plans to introduce for the physical Point of Sale.

AllthingsD and Internet Retailer are both reporting that the pilot will involved the PayPal Card and PayPal Empty Hands. See our post from several months ago for a run-down off what's going on behind the PayPal vision.

On November 17-18, 2011, the Retail Payments Risk Forum of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta hosted a conference, “The Role of Government in Payments Risk and Fraud.” They have now made some of the presentations from this conference available on the conference website.

Viableware has announced availability of the 'Rail', "an innovative pay-at-the-table system that maintains the traditional look and feel of the bill presentation folder diners are used to seeing delivered to their table, with the added capabilities of a digital interface, at-the-table credit card swiping, on-the-spot digital signing, and credit card authorization. By enabling restaurant guests to self-swipe credit or debit cards, the Rail protects them from card information theft, while also enabling restaurants to streamline payment processes and generate new advertising revenues."

Glenbrook has launched a new research effort exploring best practices among merchants about how payments and fraud risk management functions are organized, staffed, and measured.

If you work in the payments or fraud risk management functions for a merchant, please take a few minutes to complete our survey. In exchange for your help, we'll share the results with you!

You can find the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/75CQCHX

Thanks for helping us out!

VeriFone announced that GUESS has implemented the VeriFone GlobalBay solution inside a dozen stores in the U.S., taken the technology on the road to Asia, and plans to expand the deployment widely in 2012. "GUESS is using the VeriFone solution to enable consumer interaction with iPads mounted on rolling stands that serve as self-service kiosks to its online and in-store products to enhance the overall shopping experience and generate additional sales."

On the web:

• Starbucks Launches ‘pay by app’ for iPhone Users in UK - Telegraph
• Spindle Plans Mobile Payment Product for Small Banks - American Banker
• Square Expands Retail Partnerships to Include OfficeMax And UPS Store Locations - TechCrunch
• PayAnywhere Lets You Build Payments Acceptance Into An App Of Your Own - Business Insider
• Is what you see what you get? Proposed Pricing Disclosures for Electronic Remittances - Portals and Rails
• State Bank of India Drops Plan for Merchant Acquiring JV with Visa, Elavon - The Times of India
• Top 7 Card Readers For Smartphones: Apple, Android, and Blackberry - Mobile POS News
• The Future of Self-Service Checkout - STORES.org
• The State of ACH Fraud - Bank Info Security

On the wires:

• New Mercator Report on India's Prepaid Card Market
• SunGard Closes Syntesys Acquisition to Offer Expanded SWIFT Connectivity and Services
• Chase Partners with Southwest Airlines to Enhance Ultimate Rewards Travel Options for Cardmembers
• U.S. Bank Implements Secure Vault Payments for Nebraska Online Child Support Payments