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The article evaluates several products related to security technology including iris scan biometrics from Global Rainmakers Inc., Analysis Engine fraud management systems from Digital Resolve and Trusted Access for Banking solution from IronKey Inc.

The article focuses on Citibank's innovation on its retail banking system in Tokyo, Japan. It mentions that smart banking strategy is the most advanced retail technology, which comes with reengineered products, paperless transactions, and an overall bank-anywhere approach. It notes that the smart banking is a three fold strategy where it attracts, engage and connects with customers. In addition, the banking system comes in a self-service approach.

The article provides information on several innovators with their accomplishments as well as the significance of their area of expertise in financial services in 2009 in the U.S. Several innovators presented include Secil Watson of Wells Fargo, Aaron Patzer of Intuit, and William Azaroff of Vancity. It also highlights several companies and technologies for recognition including mFoundry Inc., Conexxus LLC, and ClairMail Inc.

The article offers information on the most powerful women executives in the U.S. banking industry in 2009. According to Bob Kelly, Bank of New York (BNY) Mellon Corp. chief executive officer (CEO), having women executives will led to stronger financial performance and gender equity will help the financial industry survive. Several charts which depict the 2009 ranking of women executives in the banking industry are also presented.

The article presents the 10 bank technology companies in the U.S. The deal between Fidelity Information Services (FIS) Inc. and Metavante Corp. will straighten the No. 2 and No. 3 core processing vendors. Silver Tail Systems released its Mitigation product giving responders tools to disrupt attack in real time by changing the business logic flows. MasterCard Inc. purchased Orbiscom Inc. to authorize card holders with a new generation of tools such as budgetary features and security controls.

The article presents the rankings of companies with security innovations in the areas of risk management and compliance in the U.S. Archer Technologies, ranked second, makes its customized risk management available to one another. The seventh placer Fortent makes a centralized database of rules and updates from 154 sources. The innovation from TriGeo Network Security Inc., ranked first, offers small and midsized banks a fighting opportunity to catch insiders that steals customer data.

The article focuses on the members of the All-Star Banking Team 2008 in the U.S. First Regional Bancorp was the leader among mid-sized banks, with a return on equity (ROE) of 22.9 percent. Trust banks have the most impressive collective performance, which earned higher fees from activities generated by the market's volatility. The country's top performing community bank was Mackinac Financial Corp., with an ROE of 33.11 percent. Information on a number of bank executives in the team is presented. INSETS: Wells Fargo & Co. TOP RETAIL BANK;Citi TOP WEALTH-MANAGEMENT TEAM.

The article discusses the gravity of issues associated with the emergence of nation-state threat that China's cyber army poses to the U.S. national security. The author analyzes the implications of the China-based cyber threat on the country's financial institutions. Moreover, the article probes whether the threat is government sponsored or merely randomized act of crimeware. INSET: THE Taiwan SCENARIO.

The article presents the prominent women in the banking sector in the U.S. These women who gained professional attention through their intuitive and analytical skills have created their own niche in the corporate world. Topping the list of the 25 most successful women is Golden West Financial CEO Marion O. Sandler, CEO of retail banking at Barclays Bank Deanna Oppenheimer, and BMO Financial Group CFO Karen Maidment.

The article profiles the ten hot technology companies in the U.S. in 2006. The companies, which include Oracle, PrimeRevenue, RSA Security and Diebold, offer innovative technologies spanning security, supply chain finance, business intelligence and branch transformation. Information on the firms' top executives and annual revenues are also cited.

The article reports on the case of Frank Robertson, an alleged computer hacker who masterminded the stealing of funds from various debit card and credit card customers in the U.S. Robertson is facing up to 15 years imprisonment for the said crime. His case reveals a vast black market for credit and debit card numbers, PIN and account balances, skimming kits, and packets that contain everything necessary to pull off a complete identity theft.

Offers information on women bankers, considered frontrunners in the United States business world. Barbara Desoer; Leslie Godridge; Pamela Montpelier.

Profiles the top women bankers in the United States, based on the size of the financial institution they manage. Amy Brinkley; Peyton Patterson; Marjorie Magner; Heidi Miller; Marion Sandler.

The article discusses the business condition of Heartland Payment Systems, a credit and debit card processing company in the U.S. It states that the company undergoes a massive data breach because of the disclosure of a large number of cards. Robert Carr, the company's chief executive officer (CEO) calls for an industry-wide reform of payments technology and information sharing to ward of criminals.

The article presents the Top Community Bank information technology (IT) initiatives in the U.S. The Bank of American Fork in Utah deploys an application on the Internet that enables employees to learn changing regulations and know what to do to remain in compliance. The Bank of Tennessee handles processing and printing for other community banks. The Business Bank in Wisconsin hires an IT and raises its risk to another category.

The article focuses on the move of the banks to detect fraud activities of employees. Andrew Davies, general manager at NetEconomy, stated that they get people who bring them in for several reasons because they see things in the news like Societe Generale. It notes that Actimize Inc. recently hired an independent research firm to survey 25 compliance and other executives at North American and European investment firms, and it found that they expect another $100 million in rouge trading losses.

The article reports on the financial performance of banks led by women executives in the U.S. The "U.S. Banker" magazine examined the overall outlook, diversity and growth of three banks including U.S. Bancorp, Wells Fargo & and Citigroup Inc. It showed the percentage of the total senior women executives in each firm wherein Bancorp has 24.6%, Fargo has 28% and 26% in Citigroup.

The article reports on the updates related to the acquisition of the Passmark Security by the RSA Security Inc. in the U.S. It was predicted that the acquisition will result to the maturity of the two-factor authentication, and that vendors will have a complete and cross-channel solutions for authentication and risk management of securities. It was predicted however, by the vice president of research in Gartner Avivah Litan that with the acquisition, the fire sales price of securities are over.

The article reports on the plan of the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC) to protect online banking transactions through updating the 1995 Authentication in an Internet Banking Environment, which aims to require banks to perform annual risk assessments and inform their customers about risks and coverages in case of losses.

The article reports on the offered new applications by call center goliath Nice Systems Inc. and competitor Verint Systems Inc. in the U.S. It notes that Nice is targeting a product developed as a way for banks to offer real-time compliance reminders and scripts to contract center and branch personnel. Moreover, the product from Nice offers procedural guidance to tellers who are engaged in face-to-face, phone and Internet chat conversations.

The article focuses on the customer relationship management tool offered by NICE Systems Inc. and Verint Systems Inc. to the banking industry. It states that the product provide a real-time guideline that bank tellers can use in engaging face-to-face, internet chat, and phone conversation. According to Steve William of Verint, the technology closely monitor how the agent performs her/his activity and then create a script for the effective procedure.

The article highlights the sudden increased of funding at several banking institutions in the U.S. due to consumers' continuous usage of their mobile devices.

The article features Union Savings Bank's information technology (IT) projects initiated by its senior vice-president Bill McNamara. The projects include the integration of its surveillance system with biometric recognition and search software and its Fiserv teller platform. The initial impetus of the project is to update the bank's old surveillance system and to monitor all locations to respond to robberies or fraudulent activity quickly.

The article focuses on the importance of the deployment of Applied DNA Sciences Inc.'s SigNature DNA product at London, England-based transit company Loomis for solving a bank robbery. It noted that Loomis convicted two robbers with the help of the product, whose deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) was stuck to the thieves' cellular telephones, clothes and the stolen cash. It indicated that the police were able to recognize a marker of the DNA using a rapid reader light.

Several charts depicting the state of mobile banking in 2010 in the U.S. are presented, including type of mobile telephone used by people as a primary device, consumer distribution channel penetration, and mobile browser loading speeds.

The article discusses the move taken by banks in Great Britain to fight fraudsters from compromising out-of-band authentication. The new fraud threat called phone jacking involves a fraudster who uses social engineering to persuade a telecommunication customer service agent to forward a customer's phone calls to a number controlled by the attacker. Such phone jacking among banks was confirmed by Mark Bowerman, Association for Payment Clearing Services (APACS) spokesman.

The article focuses on the support given by the Bank of New York Mellon Corp. to its employees by providing a global talent development strategy. Sheena Wilson, the global head of talent strategy, is responsible for a technology project to develop a global architecture to provide service to its global talent development strategy. Josh Bersin, president of talent consultancy Bersin & Associates, notes that companies implementing an integrated talent management strategy have reduced turnover.

The article focuses on the E3, an end-to-end encryption process from Heartland Payment Systems Inc. which is claimed would impact the security of financial system in the U.S. It is noted that the E3 started at the point of sale, with a module that borrowed security technology from ATM World. It also provides details of how E3 works and functions.

The article focuses on the significance of voice biometrics as a viable solution for multi-channel fraud among U.S. call centers. It notes that organized crime tends to exploit call center weaknesses as they develop their multi-channel business model. This is attributed to the security of online channel. It points out that whitelisting and blacklisting are two approaches to the use of voice biometrics.

The article focuses on the call to action issued by Heartland Payment Systems Inc. chief executive officer (CEO) Robert O. Carr recommending payments players to implement end-to-end encryption and share breach forensics among themselves in the U.S. Carr made good work in May 2009 with the creation of Payments Processing Information Sharing Council (PPISC). He commenced PPISC's inaugural meeting as a new subsidiary of the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FS-ISAC).

The article looks at the projects of several small community banks to offer the same technology tools provided by big banks, such as remote deposit, mobile banking, and branch capture. The author discusses several small banks which are turning large profits by altering their data infrastructure to reduce the complexity of network management. Banks mentioned include Bank of Tennessee, North Salem State Bank, and Bank of American Fork.

The article examines a computer security system developed by Bank of America Corp. The system automatically redirects bank customers who are detected visiting so-called "phishing" Web sites to another Web site which presents information on computer and Internet crimes and how to avoid them. Bank of America hopes the system becomes standard in the financial services industry.

The article focuses on the economic trends of the banking industry for the fiscal year 2009 in the U.S. It mentions that the latest optimization in the treasury function comes in the form of cash supply chain management and forecasting software and notes that such technology has reduced iCom Inc.'s cash requirements. Furthermore, by adopting the optimization among banks, Synovus Corp. was able to reduce its Federal Reserve Bank (FRB) reserve requirements saving approximately $2.6 million.

The article reports on the growth of banks adopting authentication technologies through short message services (SMS) in the U.S. It reveals that banks are implementing software that sends passwords to their customers and introduce one-time password for carrying out transactions through SMS. It was found that enhancing authentication through text messages will enhance security as well as reduce the customers exposure to online banking fraud.

The article reports on the growth in demand facing smart phones utilized for mobile banking in the U.S. It was found that the commonly used smart phones for mobile banking, include iPhone and Blackberry Smart, which recorded increased sales in 2008. It reveals that the smart phones' wide screens, efficient browsers and capacity to manage large data are among the features that make the device attractive to banks and their customers.

The article reports on the new teller platform of NorthWest Savings Bank in the U.S. The bank is making a way for the improvement of its customer experience and the increase of efficiency by employing applications that feed results from a marketing tool directly into a teller platform sales system. It has distributed the system to all its branches and hired employees through a one week training session.

The article reports on the profitability of banks that allow transactions without using ATM card. The possibility for international non-card ATM transactions could be fulfilled as innovative payment solutions provider Privier Inc. aims to solve the problem by allowing bank clients to send cash globally for pick up at any participating ATM. Western Union Co. has gained high revenues in 2008 recording remittance dollars in addition to the vast sums moved through informal networks globally.

The article reports on the profitability of some businesses amidst the recession in the U.S. Businesses in the areas of Risk management technology, customer relationship management, and integration are still doing well with strong capital position. Information technology vendors are proven to be recession proof.

The article focuses on grid computing in banks and financial institutions. A massive grid computing project was installed at Citigroup Inc.'s Capital Markets division four years ago, when the company needed more processing power to hand the risk management, market analysis, and pricing applications. Citi chose Platform Computing's Symphony grid product. It is stated that grid computing is improving the performance of the financial services industry.

The article reports on the launch of Zscaler, a new security vendor that claims an in-the-cloud security by Jay Chaudhry. It notes that Zscaler's security include standard URL filtering along with the ability to manage access to Web 2,0 features and signature-based anti-spyware and anti-virus as its service offering. Furthermore, coupled with a global security network, Zscaler's architecture sets a new standard in the SaaS security space.

An interview with Tom Doughty, vice president of information systems at Prudential, is presented. When asked about the drivers behind the mobile computing project at Prudential, he refers to take what were technically effective controls against data loss on laptops and to meet evolving external expectations. He suggests understanding and being comfortable with the ability to multiply user base, as well as selecting a full-disk encryption as opposed to file-based.

The article reports on the problems faced by Citigroup Inc.'s Capital Market division in the U.S. The problems include the increasing need for processing power to handle risk management, market analysis and pricing applications. In response, the company implements a massive grid computing project to increase utilization and decrease costs that takes priority in several organizations.

The article reports on the new Banking Industry Architecture Network (BIAN) organization established by Credit Suisse to encourage the development of standardized service in banking in the U.S. The organization has an impressive role of European bank members who are committing both membership fees and human resources, including Deutsche Bank AG. It also aims to address 50% of what can be standardized in banking services, starting with retail, private and commercial banking.

The article focuses on the strategies of PayPal Inc. in reducing the amount of phishmail at eBay Inc. and PayPal users. It notes that PayPal launched its new strategy that had reduced less than 10 percent and published in a paper entitled "A Practical Approach to Managing Phishing." Michael Barrett, a PayPal executive, stated that they observed a rise in the number of viruses and Trojans that were deployed to steal user credentials, a far more way to accomplish the same result as phishing.

The article reports on the move of the federal government to increase defense through the cyber security Manhattan Project in New York. The initiatives were codified on January 8, 2008 when President George W. Bush signed national security and homeland security presidential directives on cyber security. Many agreed that the plan represents a new level of financial and political commitment to address cyber security, offensively and defensively.

The article focuses on the launching of PassMark's SiteKey mutual authentication technology by Bank of America Corp. to provide an adaptive authentication solution to online banker customers in the U.S. RSA Security Inc., bought the technology to offers its own online banking markets with its authentication solutions and provide development of its online banking transactions. The solutions are in compliance with the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council.

The article reports on the accounting fraud happening in the bank-card industry in the U.S. In the study conducted by the Tower Group, the corrupt practices has offered a total economic losses to $700,000 which is a result of fraud on debit cards. This situation has troubled financial institutions, especially on transactions using automated teller machines.

The article reports that Aegis Lending redefines its trigger or event-based marketing to build predictive models that are highly successful. Forrest Young, vice president of marketing at Houston-based Aegis, maintains five or six different predictive models being spread among all the credit vendors. One of his relationships is with TransUnion, which started selling a turnkey version of its predictive modeling analytics and technology.

The article reports that E*Trade has been offering hardware authentication tokens to its brokerage customers in New York. The company is pushing the security envelope by becoming the first online brokerage to offer two-factor authentication to all customers. Rob Schenk, vice president of E*Trade, states that those account holders who used a SecureID to authenticate their identity increased the amount of cash by three times the rate of customers in the control group.

The article presents the author's views on issues concerning the breach of the corporate security of RSA Security Inc. She expresses apprehensions that the world's leading security vendor was not able to protect against attacks via social media or spear phishing. Moreover, the author appreciates how executive chairman Art Coviello, who has been emphasizing the importance of security in the face of pernicious threats, has survived the scandal.