Citibank Introduces World's First Biometric Credit Card

SINGAPORE: Singaporeans will be among the first in the world to use a biometric credit card.

Citibank - the world's largest credit card issuer - has chosen to launch its biometric credit cards in Singapore.

With the biometric payment system, card users do not even need to carry their cards with them.

The Citibank/Pay By Touch biometric system is expected to revolutionalise the way people shop and make payments.

Shoppers no longer need to present their credit card and sign for payment. Instead, it will just be a matter of having a finger scan followed by the keying in of a PIN number.

The bank is first introducing the card to some 190,000 cardholders between the age of 25 and 34. These users, according to the bank, spend an average of $800 a month on their credit cards.

Jonathan Larsen, CEO and Country Manager, Citibank Singapore, said, "We're launching this biometric payment solution as part of our launch of the Platinum Clear Card.

And for the next couple of months, we will focus on making the biometric solution available to our Clear customers. However, very shortly thereafter, we will be broadening this to all Citibank cardholders..."

The system uses technology belonging to Pay By Touch, a global biometric authentication and payment solutions provider. And Citibank will be the first credit card issuer in the world to use it.

Citibank says it plans to eventually expand the service to all of its one million Singapore customers.

Citibank plans to gradually introduce this payment system to other parts of Asia Pacific.

Translation: Every Asia-Pacific Region where Citibank's Platinum Clear Card is offered becomes, potentially, Pay By Touch territory. Currently, the Clear Card is being offered in the following Asia Pacific regions: Click any to go to the respective Citibank Platinum Clear Card Sites

Malaysia
The Phillipines
Taiwan
Thailand
Australia

Pay By Touch Honored as Top Innovation

Number 5 On List of Top Financial Innovation's By Bank Technology News

BTN Ranks Pay By Touch's ATM Direct Among Leading Companies, People and Technologies Changing the Financial Industry

SAN FRANCISCO and IRVING, Texas, Nov. 14 /PRNewswire/ -- Pay By Touch today announced that Bank Technology News has ranked it's ATM Direct online PIN debit offering No. 5 in its sixth annual listing of the 25 most significant companies and technologies bringing about vast change in banking.

The Bank Technology News "Innovators" ranking recognizes those companies that are significantly impacting key issues in the financial industry, including physical and online security. The publication also acknowledged companies defining new areas of business marketing and modeling.

"It is a tremendous honor for ATM Direct to be ranked among such technology and financial services industry giants as Oracle, IBM and Bank of America," said John Rogers, Pay By Touch Founder, Chairman and CEO. "Pay By Touch is changing the way America pays, both online and at retailers across the country."

ATM Direct,

a division of Pay By Touch, has created the industry's first online PIN debit payment service to bring the popular payment system to Internet users everywhere through a software-only solution that is easy to implement and easy to use.

Already, the ATM Direct online PIN debit service has been adopted by the ACCEL/Exchange® EFT Network, one of the fastest-growing Electronic Funds Transfer networks with more than 80 million cards, 650,000 merchant locations, 180,000 ATM locations, and 3,500 member financial institutions in the United States and Canada.

"In addition to being the most secure card payment method in the offline world, PIN debit has become the most popular," said Robert Ziegler, Senior Vice President and General Manager, ATM Direct for Pay By Touch. "We have combined the strength of PIN debit with our next generation authentication framework to bring that same security, comfort and ease of use to the Internet."

Pay By Touch is the only company that provides Internet PIN debit services with a software-only solution. The ATM Direct software is free and allows for a rapid, no cost distribution of its service to all participants.

About ATM Direct, a Division of Pay By Touch

ATM Direct, a division of Pay By Touch, provides innovative and secure payment and authentication services to the Internet economy. The ATM Direct(TM) merchant services deliver the industry's first software-only, regulatory compliant, Internet PIN-debit payment service. For additional information, visit www.atmdirect.com

BAI Press Announcement

Biometric Check Cashing Service Offers Fraud Prevention and Regulatory Compliance

The Pay By Touch Paycheck Secure Service to Help Banks and Credit Unions Build a Bridge to 45 Million Underbanked Consumers,

Pay By Touch, the leader in biometric authentication, personalized marketing and payment solutions, today announced that its Paycheck Secure(R) service is being offered to financial institutions. Paycheck Secure is a biometric check-cashing service that can help banks and credit unions generate additional non-interest fee-based income while decreasing the risk of fraud and meeting regulatory compliance requirements.

The Pay By Touch(R) Paycheck Secure service lets people cash checks using a simple finger scan to authenticate their identity. Already used by more than three million consumers in 1,700 retail locations nationwide, Paycheck Secure is a popular and widely adopted biometric check cashing service.

The Paycheck Secure service has been proven to drive an increase in check cashing volume in retail settings, while decreasing write-offs by 75 percent(1) as compared to other check management solutions. It has the power to help financial institutions streamline branch handling of 'on us' and 'non- bank' checks, reduce the risk of fraud and support regulatory compliance through OFAC screening and SAR and CTR reporting.

The Paycheck Secure service can also help banks and credit unions reach the more than 45 million 'underbanked' consumers(2) who are presently underserved by financial institutions. According to the Center for Financial Services Information (CFSI), this group represents 40 million households and spends $10.9 billion per year on 324 million alternative financial transactions. A 2006 study by BearingPoint and Visa reveals that the underbanked generate $1.1 trillion in income.

"There is no better way to protect the security and privacy of your customer than with our Paycheck Secure Service. Through biometrics, we can help banks to more securely address large and growing opportunities. For instance, the historically underbanked Hispanic community will drive 50 percent of the growth in retail banking in the decade to come(3)," said John Rogers, founder, Chairman, and CEO of Pay By Touch. "The Paycheck Secure service can help banks protect themselves while building a bridge to 45 million underbanked consumers."

The Paycheck Secure service is easy to use and easy to implement. Early adopter Zions First National Bank has rolled it out across 12 branch locations in Utah and Idaho. "The service is proving popular with customers because it makes the process of cashing checks quick and hassle-free," said Rob Brough, Senior Vice President of Marketing and Communications of Zions Bank. "Customers gain additional peace of mind knowing that no one else can fraudulently cash their paychecks."

"Banks and credit unions have proven far less successful than alternative financial services providers at using check cashing to build deeper relationships with the unbanked and underbanked," said Gwenn Bezard, Research Director with Aite Group. "Biometric check cashing represents a unique opportunity for banks and credit unions to turn around a commoditized product and differentiate on speed, quality and security of service to address those segments. It also offers them an efficient and secure way to expand the service to non-customers by mitigating traffic issues."

The one-time signup for the Paycheck Secure service is quick and easy to complete. To enroll new customers, banks digitally scan the consumer's I.D., take an electronic photograph and capture two fingerprints, creating a unique customer profile for that individual. At subsequent visits to the bank, the customer need only place his/her finger on the scanner to safely and securely cash payroll and government checks.

For additional information about the Paycheck Secure service, visit Pay By Touch in Booth #2370 at the BAI Retail Delivery Conference & Expo in Las Vegas, Nevada, November 14 - 17, 2006 or go to www.paychecksecure.com

About Pay By Touch

Pay By Touch ( www.paybytouch.com) is wowing the world one touch at a time as the leader in biometric authentication, personalized marketing and payment solutions. To date, the company's patented biometric services enable 3.3 million shoppers to quickly and securely access personal accounts using a finger scan to identify themselves, make purchases and cash checks at 2,400 locations nationwide. It also provides robust payment processing solutions for ACH (electronic checking), card-present and card-not-present debit and credit transactions for 138,000 retail clients. Founded in 2002 and headquartered in San Francisco, Pay By Touch employs 700 professionals and holds more than 50 patents worldwide on secure, convenient and cost-effective transaction solutions.

(1) Pay By Touch implementation analysis of Paycheck Secure within retail settings.
(2) A 2006 study by BearingPoint and Visa reveals that 28 million consumers are entirely unbanked, lacking a transactional savings or checking account, and another 17 million consumers are presently underserved by financial institutions, amounting to a total of 45 million underbanked consumers.
(3) Source FDIC

SOURCE Pay By Touch Krista Thomas of Pay By Touch, +1-415-728-2142, or krista.thomas@paybytouch.com; or Laura Bakken of Porter Novelli, +1-408-369-4667, or laura.bakken@porternovelli.com, for Pay By Touch http://www.paybytouch.com Copyright (C) 2006 PR Newswire. All rights reserved

BAI - Retail Delivery Conference & Expo
Michael D. Eisner, former Chief Executive Officer of the Walt Disney Co., will lead the first general session of the banking industry's annual meeting. He will illustrate how a focus on innovation is essential, because significant financial success is nearly always the consequence of creative breakthroughs.

Paul Kapioski, President of Thriftway, and Drew Hyatt, Senior Vice President of Pay By Touch, will present the conference session: "Biometrics: It’s Happening Today at a Store Near You!"

November 14 - 16, 2006
Mandalay Bay Resort, Las Vegas
Visit www.bai.org, e-mail: go2retail@bai.org or call 888-284-4076

Citibank is Singapore Connection

Ground-Breaking Initiative Provides Citibank Cardholders with Unprecedented Payment Convenience and Added Security

Pay By Touch, the global leader in integrated biometric authentication, personalized marketing and payment solutions, announced that Citibank Singapore has rolled out Pay By Touch's biometric payment services to its Citibank Clear Platinum cardholders. Effective today, cardholders are invited to enroll in the biometric credit card service, and pay for goods and services with the touch of a finger.

"Today's launch of our new biometric payment service in partnership with Pay By Touch gives our cardholders a whole new level of empowerment, marking a major milestone not just for Citibank but also for the card industry," said Jonathan Larsen, CEO and Country Business Manager, Citibank Singapore Ltd.

"With the credit card becoming very much a part of our daily lives, consumers want greater flexibility in making payments. We are proud to bring the world's first cardless biometric payment service to Singapore. This is the ultimate in convenience – the ability to make credit card transactions with just a finger scan."

"The biometric credit card service from Citibank and Pay By Touch sets a new standard for speed, convenience and security," said John Rogers, founder, Chairman and CEO, Pay By Touch.

"Together, we have eliminated the need for cardholders to present their credit cards when paying for purchases. Instead, they simply press their finger to a biometric scanner and, in seconds, their transaction is complete."

The new biometric payment service is available to Citibank Singapore's Clear Platinum cardholders as part of the launch of its new Clear Platinum card. To start, Citibank Clear Platinum cardholders will be able to make cardless credit card transactions at retail outlets such as music and IT stores, as well as clubs, restaurants and cinemas. Participating merchants include Zouk, Gramophone epiCentre, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and Shaw Theatre.

The biometric payment service will be introduced to more merchants and other Citibank credit cards in the near future. "We are pleased to be working with Citibank Singapore to bring an innovative and differentiating feature to the new Clear Platinum card in a crowded, highly competitive marketplace," said Drew Hyatt, Senior Vice President, Card and Authentication Services, Pay By Touch. "Already, millions of Americans love using Pay By Touch because it's a faster, easier and more secure way to pay. We are confident that Singaporeans will feel the same way."

The biometric payment service is available free-of-charge to Citibank Singapore's Clear Platinum cardholders. Enrolment takes minutes, and requires only a government-issued photo ID, a Citibank Clear Platinum credit card and a secure finger scan. Cardholders also create a seven-digit Personal Search Number, which facilitates the use of their scanned finger image to authenticate payment transactions.

The biometric enrollment kiosks will initially be made available at five branch locations: Citibank Singapore's Orchard Road, Paragon, VivoCity and Parkway Parade branches and Zouk. More kiosks will be available at other branches and merchants in future.

About Citibank

Citibank is a member of Citigroup (NYSE: C), the leading global financial services company which has some 200 million customer accounts and does business in more than 100 countries, providing consumers, corporations, governments and institutions with a broad range of financial products and services, including consumer banking and credit, corporate and investment banking, securities brokerage, and wealth management. Major brand names under Citigroup's trademark red umbrella include Citibank, CitiFinancial, Primerica, Smith Barney, and Banamex.

Additional information may be found at: www.citigroup.com

Citibank Partners with Pay By Touch

Citibank rolls out world's first biometric credit card service, targets yuppies here in Singapore - Chow Penn Neepennnee@mediacorp.com.sg

Citibank has just raised the bar for the credit card market. .You won't even need a physical card any longer to party, dine or shop. All you will need is your finger, for a scan.

Rolling out the world's first biometric credit card service yesterday, the American bank is targeting Singapore yuppies for the launch, before extending it to the rest of its over 700,000 card members here.

With the free service, cardholders need only press their finger to a biometric scanner located at participating stores. Currently, only nine outlets offer this service but others will be roped in.

Not only can customers cut down on payment queue times, they have the added protection against card fraud, said Mr Jonathan Larsen, chief executive officer and country business manager, Citibank Singapore.

"With the credit card becoming very much a part of our daily lives, consumers want greater flexibility in making payments," he said, adding that this move will transform the local payments industry.

The global bank is also looking at using biometrics for Internet banking. Other forms of biometrics involve authentication via facial and voice recognition.

Commenting on the security of the system, Mr John Morris, president and chief operating officer of US-based technology partner Pay By Touch, said the service has "military-level encryption" to ensure data security.

To assuage fears that the data collected would be misused along the way, Mr Larsen said that the digitised fingerprints are encrypted and stored in different databases from other information like the name and card numbers of cardholders.

This keeps the information separate and prevents abuse, said the bank.

Mr Larsen declined to reveal the investment amount of its biometric service, except to say it is in the "multi-million" range. Citibank plans to roll out the platform to all it's cardholders in Singapore and then move on to Malaysia and the Mainland. They also plan to use the Pay By Touch biometric platfrom for online banking and purchasing over the Internet, which is, at the end of the day, why they are partnering with Pay By Touch in the first place.

It certainly raises the competition for a market that has seen a slew of creative concepts over the years — such as shrinking the cards by half — to woo the crowds. On whether the latest biometric system will take off, intellectual property lawyer Bryan Tan said: "It's innovative. The current card technology has flaws, as we have seen from security breaches in cloning of credit cards." But he added that its popularity would depend on acceptance by both merchants and users. Merchant's certainly have a vested interest since biometric ACH transactions cost about a third less than debit transactions, which in turn, cost about 25% less than credit card transactions.

The Innovators

The Innovators

The only source of profit, the only reason to invest in companies in the future is their ability to innovate and their ability to differentiate," Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of General Electric, once observed. That thinking is a welcome reminder for the banking industry, which finds itself grappling with an inverted yield curve, commoditized products and customers who expect more from their financial relationships. By John Adams, Glen Fest, and Holly Sraeel

The good news? Innovation is occurring.

In its annual ranking, BTN profiles 25 innovators whose contributions to banking are changing the rules of the game. Here's the Top 5:

1. Bank of America - Security Team:

William Fox, senior compliance executive for financial crimes; Chris Swecker, head of corporate security; Donna Bucella, business continuity executive

Time and time again, banks have been warned that when it comes to securing the enterprise, regulators and other government agents are watching to make sure the job gets done correctly. Bank of America, though, has gone straight to the source, recruiting a group of former government insiders to give it the best security guidance possible for its complex business.

In the past year, the bank has appointed three high-level executives who are charged with oversight of the bank's operations. William Fox, BofA's senior compliance executive for financial crimes, previously worked in the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), where he had been director since 2003; Donna Bucella, BofA's business continuity executive, did a stint as head of the U.S Terrorist Screening Center for the FBI's Department of Homeland Security; and Chris Swecker, head of corporate security for the bank, is a former director at the FBI.

It's no surprise that security is front and center for the Charlotte-based bank. Public perception of how safe an institution is can be just as important as the security systems, policies and procedures put in place. For Bank of America, what better way to protect itself than by employing the very government officials once responsible for safeguarding against terrorism and financial crimes? (JA)

2. Goldman Sachs - Liquid Machines

Goldman Sachs is a bold proponent of what's called enterprise rights management (ERM), an approach to information security that could open up a new frontier in shielding sensitive data. Just how bold? It's put a little skin in the game.

The global investment banking giant is not only the marquee customer for Liquid Machines, but it's also a financial backer, joining the likes of Atlas Venture, Masthead Ventures and Draper Fisher Jurveston as the lead investor in a recent $7.5 million round of financing.

That puts Goldman on the ground floor of ERM, which marries security with the data itself, particularly key intellectual property and customer information. Access protection and usage control enforcement travel with electronic documents from machine to machine, in and outside the bank. Far beyond firewalls and gateway filters, which don't provide granular enforcement of acceptable use policy that define what users can and cannot do with data, ERM is the wave of the future. Phil Venables, managing director and chief information risk officer for Goldman, calls ERM a "significant enabler" of a protection strategy that allows for protection to reside with the information itself, not just the containers of the information. (JA)

3. IBM - Industry Models

Extending its end-to-end risk and business analytics model into the institutional investment arena, IBM launched its Financial Markets Industry Models that present data analytics, service and process templates to cover a global firm's risk assessments, all the way from the trade confirmation to eventual settlement.

The FMI models provide a real-time assessment of market, operational and credit risks; the models also audit high-risk transactions to cover exposure to Basel II capital requirements, Sarbanes-Oxley governance, and even the European Union's "MiFID" legislation, which, among other things, covers capital requirements and monitors commodity and credit derivatives. These models are similar to ones used by seven of the world's top 10 banks and insurance companies for straight-through processing, optimized workflow and business rules management. The difference? More institutions can take advantage of them. The models also help businesses delving into service-oriented architecture environments, say IBM officials, because they have pre-built business processes and service definitions. (GF)

4. ING Direct - Behavioral Marketing

The closest direct banks normally come to knowing a customer is an IP address. But with more clients coming on board with more available funds in high-yield savings accounts, ING Direct has adopted what it calls "Smart Sell" techniques to target users with ads specific to their interests and derived from multiple-channel interaction. So how does ING get to know customers they only observe through the Web or phone? Smart Sell uses a cross-channel, behavioral marketing solution based on a module from Epiphany that personalizes content on the Web site-links, banner ads, etc. In one example, a prospect calling ING's call center about a mortgage will begin to see mortgage ads the next time he or she logs in. It not only increases revenue-ING Direct head of marketing, John Owens, says there has been a "300-plus" percent increase in offer acceptance-but also keeps the bank from nagging customers with non-relevant offers. Although some banks have adopted call center CRM tools that help give a live operator some insight into a customer's behavior, Jupiter Research analyst Asaf Buchner thinks ING's solution is its unique flavor. "For traditional banking institutions, internal silos and the presence of different databases and legacy systems often inhibit these types of initiatives," he says. (GF)

5. Pay By Touch - Online PIN Debit

Brick-and-mortar stores have about a 30 percent reason to encourage customer use of PIN debit instead of signature debit at the cash register.

Online Merchants don't even have that option as signature debit is a physical impossibility, and online PIN debit has not been available. However, with the launch earlier this year of ATM Direct, a newly acquired subsidiary of biometrics firm Pay By Touch, online merchants may finally get their chance to get away from interchange fees.

ATM Direct went live with the first ever online, PIN-secured payments system last June when it announced agreements both with a small retailer (J. Paul Co.) and the ACCEL/Exchange EFT network. It would be hard for online merchants to ignore the savings PIN Debit could afford them, as they usually pay more than bricks and mortar stores in the first place, thus making online PIN Debit even more attractive. Online merchants can save about 40% on Interchange Rates, which equivocates to millions of dollars in savings for large online retailers like Amazon or Overstock.com

On the other side of the equation, online shoppers averse to handing out credit-card numbers online can install the ATM Direct software on their PCs, and are prompted to enter PINs into an on-screen keypad. The software overcomes the longstanding problem with online PIN debit, which normally requires third-party hardware systems for security reasons.

ATM Direct SVP and general manager Robert Ziegler estimates that ACH-enabled technologies could grab 50 percent of online payments market share.

The firm plans to pursue new opportunities in mobile-based PIN debit offerings in 2007.

Pay By Touch Expanding Into Singapore

Look for an upcoming announcement that Pay By Touch will expanding into Singapore coupled with whom it is they're going to be partnering and launching with. In the meantime, they are getting their website customized for the SG market. You can take a look at www.paybytouch.sg

Singapore Key Statistics:

Population & Area
Demographic Indicators
Literacy & Education
Social Indicators
Employment
Economic Indicators

With operations in the United States, the United Kingdom, Shangahi-China, and Singapore. Pay By Touch is well on their way to accomplishing their mission of becoming an international "global" payments company.

On a side note, PBT's new "hall of fame" marketer, John Costello, will be a guest on Webmaster Radio's on November 23rd to talk about Pay By Touch and his new role with the company. Stay tuned for how to listen to the podcast or click the link below...

WebmasterRadio.FM Hit Show 'DishyMix'
Announces November Guest List:

Some of the global Web 2.0 and digital marketing industry's most famous names and fascinating individuals including John Costello of Pay By Touch, formerly CMO of Home Depot, will be our guest on November 23rd.