Mobile Banking Updates - Oct 16

Huntington snares USAA’s mobile-banking ace
"Maybe it’s because I grew up rooting for a baseball team that routinely failed to be competitive, but I’ve always looked forward to the hot-stove season. Reading about a big trade or the signing of a free agent provides a thrill because they can reshape the competitive landscape. I’m feeling a similar tingle from the news that Jeff Dennes has left USAA to become chief digital officer at Huntington National Bank."

Bank of America Tests Mobile Payments
"Bank of America is a pioneer mobile payments and mobile banking arenas. BofA in May 2007 launched its mobile-banking platform and today has 5 million mobile WAP/browser-based and downloadable-banking-application subscribers. In May, the bank launched its SMS/text banking service -- a service that is open to all BofA customers -- and has more than 500,000 users. The $2.36 trillion institution is taking it a step further, moving payments to the mobile channel through a pilot it is spearheading in the New York metropolitan area."

Study: Banks Still Have Work To Do On Mobile Sites
"Tedious setup and unclear next steps are common on banking mobile sites, according to Web researchers Change Sciences Group. Consumers are wary of new technologies, expecting set-up hassles that outweigh the benefits of the service, says Steve Ellis, one of the report's authors. The most remarkable thing about the study is how bad a job some banks are doing introducing new users to their mobile services, Ellis says."

Zeus Strikes Mobile Banking
"S21sec, a global digital-security firm that provides e-crime intelligence, discovered a link between malware that was hitting online users and their mobile devices. Ultimately, it was a dual-Zeus compromise, says Daniel Brett, head of business development for S21sec. Brett says this so-called man-in-the-mobile, or Zeus Mitmo, attack is likely just the beginning, as other types of malware aimed at mobile devices can be expected."

Mobile Banking 2.0 or 0.5? – Mobile Banking for those with no mobile
"Safaricom’s M-Pesa is now so well known in the mobile banking world that it has come to be accepted by some as a blueprint for mobile financial services. The service relies on the phone in the hands of the customer (now more than 12 million) to perform transactions and the phone in the hands of the agent (all 20,000 of them) to credit and debit accounts. But in markets that have either lower penetration of mobiles or higher fragmentation among operators, offering over-the-counter (OTC) payment services may be an important alternative, or additional, strategy."

Mobile banking gets ‘no’ vote
"A new survey of 15,000 people in the U.S. and Canada has found that banking customers have so far not embraced mobile banking. In fact, only a scant 1.7 percent of U.S. respondents said they preferred to use mobile banking for routine transactions. That figure wasn’t as dismal as the percentage who said they liked to use the bank’s telephone service for routine transactions. That option was favored by less than 1 percent of the U.S. respondents."