Payments industry globalization reached a tipping point Aug. 11, 2015, when the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and Payments UK published the first draft of ISO 20022. The harmonized set of XML messaging standards is based on a shared data dictionary and business process model designed to improve efficiencies across global payment platforms. The Federal Reserve described it as "an enabler of a single, common 'language' for global financial communications that can assist organizations in responding to evolving demands."

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There is no denying the mass popularity of mobile phones, especially smartphones, and the growing use of these devices for payments. A new research paper from the ATM Industry Association, however, reveals that mobile payments are doing little to displace cash payments. "In truth, cash use is more robust and mobile payments less stellar in growth than current conventional wisdom might suggest," said Mike Lee, Chief Executive Officer at ATMIA ATMIA commissioned Tremont Capital Group to research the payments ecosystem in the United States and abroad. What the researchers discovered was that between 2009 and 2013 average yearly growth in cash overall exceeded economic yearly economic growth rates by a factor of three.

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Established by Inc. magazine in 1982, the Inc. 500/5000 list is considered a bellwether of the fastest-growing privately held companies in the United States. Numerous high-ranking payment and alternative lending companies are included in the 2015 list which was released Aug. 12, 2015. Leigh Buchanan, Inc.'s Editor-at-Large noted a median year-over-year growth rate of 1,772 percent among honorees and named healthcare, financial services and technology as the most robust sectors of the U.S. economy. "In response to a survey question, hundreds of Inc. 500 CEOs described hard lessons learned from experiences that could have killed, but ultimately strengthened, them," she wrote. "Some of those lessons involved brass tacks: how to price proposals, hedge risks, divide equity, or establish metrics."

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The highly anticipated launch of Samsung Pay materialized first in Korea on Aug. 20, 2015, and followed with an open beta trial for U.S. financial institutions starting Aug. 25 in advance of the nationwide rollout slated for Sept. 28. The newest entrant in the mobile-driven payments space has a unique advantage in that it facilitates both near field communication (NFC) and magnetic (mag) stripe payments. As acquirers and merchants race to replace mag stripe POS terminals with newer Europay/MasterCard/Visa-chip enabled terminals by the Oct. 1 fraud liability shift deadline, Samsung Pay's dual approach is expected to ease the transition for countless merchants, who could take years to achieve full compliance with card brand mandates.

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San Francisco-based Square Inc. disclosed on Aug. 15, 2015, that it launched Instant Deposit in the United States. Participating sellers can elect to pay an additional 1 percent processing fee to have credit card transactions deposited into their banks in a matter of seconds. The move follows a successful two-month beta test conducted across the United States. The test involved thousands of merchants and more than $10 million in deposits, Square noted. A payments aggregator established in 2009, Square has striven to find ways to remove friction from merchant boarding and acquiring. The company's simplified pricing models and next-business-day funds availability have proven popular with millions of small business owners in the United States, Canada, Japan and Australia.

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The National ATM Council Inc. (NAC) expects a record turn-out for its third annual NAC2015 Conference & Expo to be held Sept. 15 through 17, 2015, at the Las Vegas Tropicana. Exhibit hall space and hotel rooms have sold out, but there is no shortage of space for attendees, the nonprofit association reported. NAC credits its support of independent ATM deployers (IADs) and a varied conference agenda with gaining interest and attendance in the upcoming event. "Our theme for the NAC2015 Conference & Expo is Success Today and Tomorrow, and this year's event will, in fact, be all about helping America's talented and hardworking ATM owners and operators succeed in both today's competitive ATM marketplace and in the world of evolving payments technologies," said Bruce Wayne Renard, NAC Executive Director.

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Americans are using debit cards more, especially for small dollar purchases. They also make fewer withdrawals from ATMs than they did just a decade ago. These are two key trends reported in the 2015 Debit Issuer Study from Pulse, a network owned by Discover Financial Services. Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve has published a “clarification” of how it determined debit interchange caps when it was directed to do under the Durbin Amendment to the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act.

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Irving, Texas-based global information technology service provider Trend Micro released Russian Underground 2.0. Authored by Max Goncharov, a member of Trend Micro's Forward-Looking Threat Research Team, the report is a sequel to Russian Underground 101, a study of Russian cyber crime Trend Micro published in 2012. Trend Micro began researching the Russian Underground in 2004. Since then, the Underground has become more professional and sophisticated, mirroring legitimate trends in supply chain management, outsourcing and customer service support.

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ShopKeep, a POS technology provider established in 2008 and based in New York City, released a new report Aug. 4, 2015, titled Small Business Index (SSBI). In-store sales data and results from 1,260 ShopKeep customers polled between June 13 and 27 formed the basis for the study. ShopKeep's cloud-based POS platform for iPad cash registers includes inventory management tools and data analytics. Approximately 16,000 independent small to midsize businesses in the United States, Guam and Canada are using the solution.

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A U.S. appeals court on Aug. 4, 2015, reversed a lower court decision to throw out a lawsuit alleging MasterCard Worldwide, Visa Inc. and three large banks conspired to fix ATM charges. The class action suit was filed in 2011 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by a group consisting of consumers and ATM owners, operators and ISOs. Plaintiffs were challenging card brand rules that prohibit ATM operators from taking advantage of better interchange rates and offering lower cardholder fees for transactions processed over PIN-debit networks that are not affiliated with Visa or MasterCard. Those rules are said to benefit major banks, which are equity shareholders of Visa and MasterCard, specifically Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Wells Fargo & Co., the plaintiffs argued.

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Alina, Chewbacca and Punkey are just a few names on a long list of POS malware infiltrating the payment processing community. A report published July 7, 2015, by the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center, the Retail Cyber Intelligence Sharing Center and the United States Secret Service, with the support of Visa Inc., highlights malware as an immediate danger to POS systems. The advisory, titled Alert and Recommendations: Securing Merchant Card Payment Systems from the Risks of Remote Access, identifies common cyber exploitation threats and proposes tactics, techniques and procedures that retailers and payment service providers can use to help mitigate attacks. These methods, called TTPs, are straight out of the FS-ISAC, R-CISC and Secret Service playbooks.

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