Customers of US fuel and convenience store chain Mapco can now pay at the pump with their mobile phone at 276 of the retailer’s stores... More
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CaixaBank invests in contactless ATMs
Spain’s CaixaBank has signed a €500million agreement with Fujitsu for the delivery of a new network of 8,500 ATMs equipped with contactless readers “capable of scanning cards, mobile phones and wearables”... More
Evidence builds for NFC in iPhone 6
Apple’s next iPhone will feature its own payment platform, “sources familiar with the matter” have told Wired... More
Smart Card Alliance offers HCE paper
The Smart Card Alliance has published Host Card Emulation (HCE) 101, a white paper that “takes a deep dive into HCE and NFC opportunities and security considerations”... More
Square lets consumers send cash by text
Payments startup Square has expanded its Square Cash service, which lets US consumers send money to a contact via email, to include support for sending funds via an SMS text message... More
Citi launches digital wallet
Financial services giant Citi has launched a digital wallet that uses MasterCard’s MasterPass technology to let US credit card holders “more quickly and conveniently make purchases at thousands of online merchants”... More
Estimote unveils BLE stickers
Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacon maker Estimote has introduced a new product category that it calls “nearables”, stickers that contain a Bluetooth Smart controller, an ARM processor and both an accelerometer and a temperature sensor... More
IPC Media promotes magazine sales via convenience store beacons
Publisher IPC Media is using Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons installed in 740 One Stop convenience stores across the UK to offer discounted copies of its Chat, Pick Me Up, Woman and TV & Satellite Week magazines... More
St George adds fingerprint security to mobile banking app
Customers of Australia’s St George Bank will be able to use the Touch ID fingerprint verification technology built into the iPhone 5S to log into mobile banking when iOS8 launches in September... More
Boston Fed reports on mobile payments
The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston has published Update on the US Regulatory Landscape for Mobile Payments, a summary of the latest meeting of the Mobile Payments Industry Workgroup (MPIW)... More
Walmart moves to EMV
Walmart MasterCard holders are to receive a replacement card “in the next few weeks” that includes an EMV chip... More
NTT Docomo picks Gemalto for NFC
NTT Docomo, Japan’s largest mobile phone carrier, is to use Gemalto’s Allynis trusted service management (TSM) service and its UpTeq SIMs for the rollout of its NFC platform... More
Analysts report on Apple/Visa partnership
“We think a partnership between Apple and Visa would make strategic sense and believe an announcement could happen as early as this fall,” a team of Pacific Crest Securities analysts has concluded in a new report that follows reports suggesting that two are in talks on mobile payments... More
US merchant groups call for creation of open tokenization standards
Leading merchant groups in the US have come together to call for the creation of an alternative set of open standards for tokenized payments that would be managed by an independent body such as ISO or ANSI — rather than by the payments industry. More
Facebook closes gifts business
Facebook is to close down its gifts service on August 12, Techcrunch reports... More
Amazon Wallet teams up with Blackhawk
Amazon is working with prepaid specialist Blackhawk Network on its new Amazon Wallet service, which lets Android and Fire users store gift cards and loyalty cards on their mobile phone... More
Square unveils EMV card reader
Mobile POS provider Square is to introduce a new card reader that can be used to process both EMV chip card and magnetic stripe card payments... More
Nestle runs NFC marketing campaign in 480 Woolworth stores across Australia
Shelf banners equipped with NFC tags have been placed in Woolworths supermarkets across Australia to promote food giant Nestle’s new Oats and Strawberries breakfast cereal... More
American Express tests HCE for NFC payments
American Express is working with Croatia’s Privredna Banka Zagreb (PBZ), part of the Italy-based Intesa Sanpaolo banking group, to pilot an NFC payments service that makes use of host card emulation (HCE) technology... More
HBC deploys iBeacons in Hudson’s Bay and Lord & Taylor department stores across the US and Canada
HBC Department Store Group has begun using Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons placed around its Hudson’s Bay and Lord & Taylor department stores in Canada and the US “to deliver digital experiences to consumers’ smartphones while they shop”... More