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Your source for the latest technology information of interest to community banks across America.

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter and stay on top of the latest technology trends in Hardware, Software, ATMs, Biometrics, Wireless, Online Banking, Marketing, Security, Internet Access and Call Centers.

August 11, 2014

Complimentary Webinar

The Check is NOT in the mail: Easy to use, cost effective payment collection tools that reduce delinquencies & offer customers multiple payment options

How many times have you heard delinquent customers say, "THE CHECK IS IN THE MAIL!"? If you are interested in learning how they were able to solve this time and money consuming issue you need to attend this informative webinar.


What You Will Learn:

• How any computer with Internet access can be used to accept payments by phone
• Emailing payment receipts to comply with NACHA rules
• Easy reporting tools to reconcile payments
• Charging convenience fees: Are you eligible?
• Easy website and IVR payments for 24/7 payment collection

Who Should Attend: Any community bank looking to reduce delinquent payments.
 

Date: Schedule a 30-minute live demonstration at your convenience!


Costs: Complimentary

To Register: http://www.banktt.com/webinars.htm  
 

Hardware News

Samsung announced its first Pro series SSD based on 3D vertical NAND (V-NAND) technology. The new model is faster than the company's previous 840 Pro series SSD, which was based on typical planar (2D) NAND. As with all new SSDs, the Samsung 850 Pro uses the SATA III (6Gbps) interface. The drive also offers a dynamic thermal guard feature, which maintains ambient temperature while operating and prevents potential data loss from overheating.

Broadwell is the next chipset coming from Intel which will be followed by its successor, Skylake, which could also be in PCs next year. With Skylake, Intel hopes to disconnect wires from PCs with integrated support for wireless docking, charging, display and data transfers. Intel recently previewed the wire-free technology at Computex, with computers not needing power cords, display connectors and peripheral cables.
 

Hardware Section Sponsored by
MVi

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Software Updates

Banks looking to stress-test their consumer loan portfolios have a new tool available: FICO's Score Economic Calibration Service 2.0. This software is designed to forecast how consumer credit risk could change under different economic scenarios as a way to measure eventual bank losses and capital reserve needs. The tool can make capital planning decisions at both a portfolio and individual account level.

The end of extended support for Windows Server 2003 is just under a year away. Banks still running this OS will need to look at their migration options soon because some experts place the average server migration timetable at 200 days. By some accounts, organizations attempting to migrate from Windows Server 2003 to Windows Server 2012 R2 are experiencing various issues, particularly related to Kerberos authentication problems that can halt the migration completely. According to Microsoft, any migration should consist of four steps: 1) discovering the existing environment, 2) assessing workloads, 3) determining where those workloads can be moved to, and 4) the actual migration of the workloads.

Software Section Sponsored by
Raddon Financial Group (RFG)

 

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ATMs/Kiosks

Touchmate has launched its TouchPad business tablet which is built on Hewlett Packard technology with an Intel 4GB processor. The tablet has printing capabilities and contains TouchPad Business Manager Software that allows lockdown, remote monitoring and software maintenance. It can be used in stand-alone mode or in kiosk applications.

Google is enhancing security in Android L for better device management and privacy for enterprises using the OS. It has also partnered with Samsung to bring its Knox security suite to Android natively. Task locking will also be added which will only permit the use of one app at a time for special purposes. Some observers believe that these features may make Android a good candidate for running kiosks or even ATMs in the future.

ATMs/Kiosks Sponsored by
Heritage Industries

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Wireless World


Mitek announced enhancements to its mobile imaging platform that advance its account opening, deposit and payment capabilities. New capabilities include:

- Credit card scanning for payments

- ID cards for account opening

- ADA compliance via integration with Android TalkBack and iOS VoiceOver which enables visually impaired consumers to take advantage of mobile imaging enabled services

- Multi-Language support

Westpac New Zealand will launch an app next month that uses augmented reality to let consumers get account information on their screens simply by viewing their cards through their phones' cameras. They claim to be the first to allow those who download the iOS app to be able to slide their credit or debit card under their phone to activate the camera. They will then see augmented reality, 3D images showing their balances, transaction history, spend locations, payments alerts and other information. Users can also scan their surroundings to find Westpac ATMs and branches.

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Security Section


Virtual machine jumping, also known as hyper jumping, can be used to gain access to other hosts. One common way to prevent VM/hyper jumping is to use separate groups of physical uplinks for groups of similar VLANs. Enhanced security is possible via Private VLANs. PVLANs are like VLANS but they have a unique feature: they allow the guest to only talk to the gateway, in effect hiding the rest of the machines from seeing each other. Finally, most hypervisor platforms have built-in firewalls that need to be properly configured to restrict access to the management network, and it is also advisable to keep the uplinks separate using appropriate techniques (routing and firewalls). 

Thomson Reuters has unveiled a Web-based portal for managing Know Your Customer (KYC) requirements. Dubbed Accelus Org ID KYC Managed Service, the new online portal facilitates customer on-boarding, identity collection, and verification. The service is centrally updated as new regulations come into effect and covers rules and regulations surrounding the AML, FATCA, and Dodd-Frank.
 

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Leaders Roundtable

Online & Mobile Banking:

Online and Mobile Banking – Improving & Bridging the Digital Channels

Bluepoint
Bluepoint Solutions - http://www.bluepointsolutions.com
Read Andrew Tilbury's comments:
http://www.banktt.com/Bluepoint.pdf

 

D+H
D+H - http://www.dh.com
Read Tom Berdan's comments:
http://www.banktt.com/D+H.pdf

 

 
IMM - http://www.immonline.com  
Read John Levy's comments:

 

Onbase
Javelin Strategy & Research - http://www.javelinresearch.com
Read Mark Schwanhausser's comments:
http://www.banktt.com/Javelin.pdf

 

Mercator Advisory Group -http://www.mercatoradsvisorygroup.com
Read Pradeep Moudgal's comments:    
http://www.banktt.com/Mercator.pdf

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Technology and Marketing

Mobile banking logins exceeded online logins for the first time late in 2013, and by some estimates, smartphone users engaged with mobile apps for more than 30 hours a month. Plus, the time consumers spent with mobile applications exceeded the time spent accessing the Internet from desktop computers for the first time ever in 2014. These statistics have led some marketing experts to conclude that the future of marketing is about mobile. They argue that mobile technologies will change the way banks market their products and services and that activity-based marketing in particular will be the future of mobile marketing in banking.

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Online Banking/E-Commerce/Website Design


As the EMV deadline approaches, a completely operational EMV environment is likely several years away, but progress is being made. The Mercator Advisory Group projects that 58% of credit cards and 26% of point-of-sale (POS) terminals will be EMV-compliant by the end of 2015. The research firm notes that these factors will be considered as influencing EMV credit card issuance:

- Issuers' willingness to stray from typical credit card refresh cycles

- Potential EMV card supply constraints

- Timeline for BIN certification and EMV pilots before general issuance 

- Card network liability shifts

- Incremental costs associated with PIN and/or contactless support 

- Competitive forces in the industry

- Increased customer service issues

- Future regulatory action

- Past and future data breaches

The Secure Remote Payment Council is seeking the development of a tokenization standard that is more open, so that a single token can be used by multiple parties to guarantee security. The council is calling for a common applications programming interface for all parties to access for token conversion, but it has raised issues with EMVCo's approach to the problem. The council desires a tokenization system with end-to-end functionality that works across multiple companies and supports one-time or limited-use tokens. An open standard would let vendors retain their existing tokenization systems or make their tokens interoperable with the standard when the data moves into a card brand's network.

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Internet Access

Vidyo has announced VidyoDesktop Virtual Edition (VE), a videoconferencing desktop client designed for virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) environments. The new offer extends the Vidyo solution to Citrix virtual desktop offerings including Citrix XenDesktop and XenApp. The platform features the ability to separate video and VDI traffic which allows for optimum network and bandwidth management.

According to results from an Internet traffic study, network traffic congestion is a real problem, with congestion on some networks lasting 18 hours a day. However, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory adds that the problems are sporadic and often temporary, and traffic congestion at interconnection points between broadband providers and backbone providers doesn’t appear to be widespread.

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Call Centers

Naturally, average call duration (ACD) is an extremely popular benchmark in all call centers, large and small. ACD is a simple measurement that tracks the length of time a customer is on the phone. ACD detractors contend that too much emphasis is placed on this metric and that agents should not be pressured to lower their ACDs if it means lowering service level in the slightest. Zappos, which is world famous for outstanding customer services levels in their contact center, tracks average call time per agent, but the goal isn't to reduce the ACD. In fact, Zappos longest call on record lasted more than eight hours, and the agent was lauded for it. However ACD proponents counter that tracking this number gives you insight into how long calls generally take, so that you can staff your center accordingly and bring in more staff during peak times. It will also show you patterns with how the different agents work with customers. Finally, it can be used to see if call length changes are affected by coaching efforts and training programs.

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