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Its newest marketing scheme allows customers to use their mobile phones to collect redeemable loyalty points off of Subway products.
 
Subway's marketing scheme will rely on Java-based software provided by Transactor Technologies Ltd., a specialist software development company. Transactor Technologies Ltd. offers comprehensive end-to-end solutions for its clients by providing functions such as customer and transaction management systems.

According to Transactor Technologies Ltd., the heart of its software suite is "Thor Transactor, which provides an open-platform processing engine that seamlessly interacts with traditional transaction capture and processing systems. This provides a bridge between older (legacy) installed systems and evolving or emerging transaction technologies."
 
Thor Transactor incorporates a powerful and flexible points management engine that enables very specific rules to be set for issuing and redemption of rewards. Transactor Technologies Ltd. offers a product relevant to this capability, called Loyalty+Plus. Loyalty+Plus is an application that allows the implementation of many types of functions, such as allowing cardholders to issue and redeem loyalty points. The software also tracks cardholder purchases.
 
Subway intends to follow-up on this campaign by releasing a more dynamiciPhone (News - Alert) application at a later date. It is a wise decision for the company, as iPhones now comprise over 14 percent of the smartphone market. This makes Apple (News - Alert) the third largest smartphone manufacturer in the United States. By developing a variation of this marketing technique specifically for Apple phones, Subway stands to reach a broader audience.
 
More and more companies are embracing mobile-scannable barcode technology, as barcodes can be placed on posters, product labels, or other media - allowing passersby to scan them with their phone to get to companies' websites. This can be especially useful when trying to participate in promotions, giveaways, or sweepstakes.
 
Heineken, the beer manufacturer, recently employed similar barcode technology in an ad campaign. Other companies, like the Pittsburgh Post-GazettePapa John's International Inc., are also hopping on the bandwagon, as mobile-scannable barcodes are proving adept at reaching consumers directly.
 
And there are benefits to this barcode technology for industries other than marketing. In the medical field, barcode technology is proving to reduce prescription and medication administration errors, making patient care safer. As pertains to education, Tele.ring, a VMNO with T-Mobile Austria (News - Alert), tapped into NeoMedia's 2D mobile barcode capabilities in order to introduce students to the concept of mobile barcode reading. Students had theopportunity to download the NeoReader for free and scan the QR codes that appeared on the posters, where they could access free mobile content such as ring tones and wallpapers.


Erin Monda is a TMCnet Contributing Editor. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.

Edited by Michael Dinan
While there are many trends in the credit and debit card industry, security is the trend that most restaurants should put at the top of their list. Security goes beyond locking the front door at closing time. Restaurant operators also must secure the sensitive information their customers provide when paying for their services.
 
Identity theft and credit card fraud are chief concerns for consumers and the credit card industry, and should have great significance to the restaurant operator. Card and identity thieves are becoming increasingly more capable.
 
In 2009, there was a considerable increase in businesses affected by security breaches in the hospitality and restaurant industry. In response to the growing threat, major credit card brands like Visa and MasterCard have continued to increase the scope and rigor of consumer protection standards.
 
The PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) has been implemented in phases, with various deadlines, to control the way card data is transmitted and stored. Credit card processors have a looming deadline of July 1, 2010, to ensure their customers operate in a PCI compliant manner.
 
The PCI DSS standard covers many aspects of storing and handling credit card data. The PCI PED (PIN Entry Devices) component is focused on the hardware used at the point of sale (POS) for capturing the 4-digit PIN number on a consumer's debit card. Restaurant owners must ensure that debit card accepting devices are PCI PED compliant, or they risk fines and fees from their processors and the card brands.
 
While the July 1 deadline is directed at the member organizations (banks), processors enabling the acceptance of these transactions are expected to ensure their customers comply with these standards. Many processors are mandating that their customers undergo a PCI audit to ensure compliance and are assessing fees for those customers that do not comply.
 
The goal of these fees is to encourage customer compliance, which will help reduce the risk to both the merchant and the processor. A PCI audit varies in cost, based on the price negotiated by the customer or processor, but is intended to identify security concerns, including devices, software, and processes, that may expose the merchant to the risk of data theft.


Scientists have identified security flaws in chip and pin technology that they say are so serious as to require a rethink of the whole system.

The Cambridge University researchers discovered a loophole that could be used to make bank card payments without knowing the correct pin.

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The conventional wisdom is that when large vendors enter a niche market, those vendors "legitimize" that market. But the announcement that First Data and RSA Security are getting into the credit card tokenization business raises many issues beyond them simply "making" the tokenization market. Here is my first take on the implications of this announcement:

Posted from StorefrontBackTalk

  • Pressure On The PCI SSC To Embrace Tokenization
    The PCI Security Standards Council already commissioned Price-Waterhouse Coopers to do a study of tokenization, end-to-end encryption and other "beyond PCI" issues. The results will likely be discussed at the PCI SSC Community Meetings. That's great. Merchants, service providers and even QSAs want specific guidance about tokenization. This announcement and the weight of the players in the market should virtually guarantee that tokenization will be specifically addressed in the next release of PCI DSS, in addition to QSA training and other guidance from the SSC.

  • Pressure On Payment Processors And Gateways
    I have said before that the number of companies offering tokenization will increase several-fold within a year. We've already seen about a dozen players enter the market in the last six months. I'm expecting 30 to 40 more announced packages over the next six months, as payment processors, gateways, encryption vendors and application vendors all vie to see who can remove credit card data from the merchant environment the fastest.

  • Tokenization Standards And Portability Will Be Hot Topics In 2010
    The more options in the market, the more the demand for "token switching" will increase. Merchants who have entrusted their card data to Service Provider X will increasingly seek shorter duration contracts and have more specific demands about how they migrate their data from one tokenization provider to another.


    Because there are not currently any standards for either the form of a credit card token, how it is generated or how one token type can be converted to another (they can't, BTW), as more merchants realize this, they will raise concerns about being "locked in" to a particular tokenization approach. Smaller vendors will develop "token migration" or conversion tools, etc.

  • Multi-Channel Options And Other Complexity Issues Will Emerge


    Read rest of story at StorefrontBackTalk


  • Worth noting Heartland Payment Systems and RBS Worldpay have been removed from Visa Inc.'s list of PCI compliant service providers and will have to undergo new PCI assessments and reapply for inclusion on the compliance list, according to a Visa announcement.

    Visa's action came after the two companies revealed they were victimized by hackers who managed to plant malicious software in the companies' internal processing systems and steal card data from the unencrypted data stream. Heartland had been listed as under review -- but still compliant -- prior to Friday's announcement, but now Visa has removed the Princeton, N.J.-based company from its lengthy list of service providers compliant with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). It was unclear whether RBS also had been under review.

    This was noted on the ETA Compliance Portal and it looks to be a very helpful resource. Here is some of the information.


    For list of validated applications click here

    The OCS DSS Quick Reference Guide is located here pci_ssc_quick_guide.pdf

    The ETA Compliance portal is located at http://www.electran.org/content/view/535/211/
    Technology ROI -- By moving to a thin-client software architecture using the Microsoft Windows Server operating system, Domino's has been able to lower the investment cost for franchisees by several thousand dollars. In addition, by moving to the thin-client environment, Domino's has reduced the amount of information stored at each of its workstations to help achieve compliance with Payment Card Industry (PCI) data security standards.
    SUBWAY announces a partnership with Torex to implement its Quick Service Restaurant POS solution globally. Upon completion of the roll out the SUBWAY chain will have Torex software installed in over 30,000 of its restaurants in 87 countries. 

    With a large network of franchisee operations, SUBWAY needed one global POS solution designed for large complex environments; achieving a balance between the franchisee needs for value and the corporate mission to support growth. Torex Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) POS was selected for its unique ability to scale across the entire global organisation as well as Torex staff's deep knowledge of the needs and challenges facing SUBWAY on an international scale. The solution is also capable of growing with the business as the SUBWAY restaurant chain continues its expansion program. Additionally, working with a proven global solution means that sandwich franchisor minimizes the risk to its business while controlling costs and enabling speed to market. 

    "We understood that this evaluation process was going to result in the largest global deployment of a commercially available solution in the QSR market. We spent over 11 months evaluating over 25 vendors, our choice was unanimous...Torex," says Thys Van Hout, SUBWAY's chief technology officer.



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