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Credit Union tech-talk News
March 9, 2009 - March 13, 2009
General News
* Genisys CU Goes with UltraData
* Open Solutions Signs Bank-Fund Staff FCU
* CU*Answers Announces Compliance Website
* First Entertainment CU Goes Live with MeridianLink
* Akcelerant Purchases The Guthrie Phillips Group
Harland Financial Solutions announced that its UltraData Enterprise core processing solution has been selected by the fourth largest credit union in Michigan: Genisys Credit Union of Auburn Hills. Harland Financial Solutions also signed Bull Dog Federal Credit Union in Hagerstown, MD; Syracuse Cooperative Federal Credit Union in Syracuse, NY; and Huron Area Education Federal Credit Union and HB Telco Federal Credit Union, both of South Dakota.
Open Solutions, a leading provider of integrated, enterprise-wide data processing technologies for credit unions throughout the United States, Canada and other international markets, announced that Bank-Fund Staff Federal Credit Union, Washington, D.C., has selected The Complete Credit Union Solution: DNA, an enhanced relational core processing platform. In addition to The Complete Credit Union Solution: DNA, Bank-Fund Staff FCU will also implement Open Solutions’ cView, Channel Management Center, ProfitVision, telephony solutions and customized Professional Services.
Audit Link, the compliance and auditing division of CU*Answers, announced the roll-out of its new website, “The Advisor.” The Advisor is designed for the community of auditors and compliance officers in the credit union industry utilizing the CU*Answers flagship processing system, CU*BASE. The site’s focus is on disseminating information garnered through the day to day discussions between CU*Answers Compliance Specialists, and credit union professionals.
MeridianLink, a leading provider of enterprise business solutions, announced that First Entertainment Credit Union recently went live with their Opening Act solution. First Entertainments' employees can use just one system for new accounts and lending, and the software is closely integrated with their Symitar Episys core system.
Akcelerant Software, a provider of software solutions to credit unions for sales and service, lending, collections, and recovery, announced the purchase of The Guthrie Phillips Group (GPG), a financial software provider based out of Vancouver, Canada. GPG has been renamed Akcelerant Software Canada ULC and is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Akcelerant Software LLC.
Hardware News
Intel's enterprise-class SSD (solid state drive) looks like its predecessor, the X25-M, and but is quite different. That is because the X25-E is based on fast SLC flash memory chips, while the X25-M incorporates cheaper MLC flash. There are two different types of flash memory on the market: multi-level cell (MLC) and single-level cell (SLC). MLC stores multiple bits of data in each flash memory cell, making it less expensive. SLC costs much more, but allows direct access to each bit of data, which enables better performance for random access and write operations. Drives that use SLC memory are starting to make their way into data centers due to their higher performance levels, as well as their lower energy costs.
Western Digital announced an 8 terabyte (TB) version of its ShareSpace network storage appliance. The ShareSpace is a four-bay storage system equipped with Gigabit Ethernet. It can be configured in RAID Level 0, 1 and 5 arrays and inside the device are four 2TB WD Caviar Green hard disk drive mechanisms. "Green"-branded hard drives from WD consume less power - up to 33 percent less power, according to the manufacturer.
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Software Updates
ActivePDF's PrimoPDF is a free utility that lets you create PDF files from more than 300 types of files, including text files, graphic files (e.g., .bmp, .jpg, .tif), and Microsoft Office files (e.g., .doc, .ppt, .xls). If you don't already have the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0, you'll need to install it from the Microsoft Download Center or let the PrimoPDF installer download it for you. PrimoPDF installs as a printer on your computer, so when you want to create a PDF file, you just select PrimoPDF as your printer.
Windows Server 2008 features Server Core which has a command-line interface, read-only domain controllers and a lighter footprint than Server 2003. The forthcoming R2 (release 2) includes some minor changes, but perhaps most importantly is being developed in tandem with Windows 7, so the two will work better together. Certain Windows 7 features like Branch Cache and Direct Access will require R2 functionality, plus Group Policy settings for Windows 7 will be enhanced in R2 as well. There is also a new server management tool called the Best Practices Analyzer, which scans servers and reports best practice violations back to the administrator.
Network management tools are constantly getting more powerful and affordable. We will cover three nice options in the April issue of Credit Union tech-talk - subscribe now.
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Software Section Sponsored by
Raddon Financial Group (RFG)
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ATMs/Kiosks
Chinese ATM manufacturer GRG Banking was displaying their next-generation H38N ATM at the recent ATM Industry Association U.S. conference. The H38N comes with a 15-inch color touchscreen and a full line of plug-and-play peripherals, such as a check scanner. It is also available as a drive-up unit. The firm claims that in 2008, they were the No. 1 manufacturer of all ATMs in China.
In Illinois, Senate Bill 1355 is pending in the Financial Institutions committee. This legislation calls for ATM deployers to install reverse-PIN software that automatically notifies police in a robbery situation. A similar bill was proposed a few years ago in Illinois, but was modified to make the mandatory provision voluntary and never passed.
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Biometric Digest Highlights - WWW.BIODIGEST.COM
Privaris, a biometrics applications company, announced that it has teamed with RSA to achieve interoperability between RSA SecurID two-factor authentication technology and its plusID family of personal, wireless biometric identity verification devices. The plusID token generates the RSA SecurID one-time password only after successful verification of the authorized user's fingerprint on a personal device. The one-time password is then automatically transmitted to the host computer via USB or a Bluetooth wireless connection. The companies say that employees can now carry a single token that verifies their identity via biometrics for secure access at multiple doorways and vehicle gates, as well as to computers, networks, websites, software, VPNs, encrypted files, and online applications.
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Wireless World
According to Javelin Strategy and Research, nearly one-fifth of Gen Y consumers (19%) say they have not signed up for mobile banking for the simple reason that their financial institution does not offer it yet. That indication of desire is nearly double that from baby boomers (10%) and is significantly higher than for consumers in general (13%).
Twenty six operators worldwide are committed to the long-term evolution (LTE) 4G standard, according to research by the Global Mobile Suppliers Association. The LTE standard promises download data rates of at least 100Mbps. In the U.S., three network operators have committed: Verizon, MetroPCS, and CenturyTel. But consumers probably won't experience the full impact of 4G until 2012 or 2013, when Strategy Analytics forecasts that the global LTE handset market will increase from 70 million sales units to 150 million.
Almost one-fifth of US Internet households claim to have used their mobile phones to initiate payment transactions, according to research conducted by Synergistics. Eighteen percent of the 1003 consumers surveyed reported that they have performed some type of mobile payment, including online bill payment, transfers or payments to individuals, online loan payments, and online purchases. Usage is widest in the $35K to $49K bracket, says Synergistics, reaching one-quarter of this group before declining somewhat as income increases.
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Security Section
Aladdin Knowledge Systems claims that their Aladdin eSafe package is the industry's first-ever Web security solution that offers advanced Web 2.0 application controls for popular social networking sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook. Aladdin eSafe users now have the capability to not just block or allow access to social networking sites, but can control specific functions within the sites. The latest release of Aladdin eSafe AppliFilter now allows eSafe customers to restrict specific functionality on popular social networks.
In a Gartner survey of nearly 5,000 consumers, 70% said they had never been a victim of identity theft fraud. Meanwhile 14% said they had had their credit card information used to charge purchases or get money, 7% said their debit card was used, 6% said a new account had been opened in their name, 5% had money transferred out of their account, and 4% had had checks forged. Unfortunately, the study said that "the chances of a criminal getting arrested and convicted for identity theft-related fraud are much less than a half of 1 percent."
One security vendor claims that 20,000 to 30,000 new unique malware samples are coming out every day, and that this barrage makes anti-malware signature databases untenable. Perhaps that is why so many security providers are turning their attention to behavior-based approaches. We will cover this topic in the April issue of Credit Union tech-talk - subscribe today.
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Leaders Roundtable
Security:
Protecting Member Data at Rest and in Motion
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Technology and Marketing
DML Communications, a public relations and marketing firm for the financial services industry, is offering social media tools to assist credit unions and credit union vendors in spreading their messages via viral marketing. Consulting services will cover online social media tools such as blogging, video logging, podcasting, and more. The firm says that one popular social media tool, blogs, can improve an organization’s search engine placement, promote qualified individuals within organizations as experts in their field, and gain instant feedback from clients/members through the “comment” feature.
Arizona State Credit Union is doing its part to get the economy going and support green projects by providing construction loans to Hope Construction, Flagstaff's first solar-powered multi-family housing development. Hope Construction specializes in eco-friendly residential planning and construction.
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Online Banking/E-Commerce/Website Design
The Accel/Exchange electronic funds transfer network, a unit of Fiserv, has signed a few issuers for an Internet-based PIN debit pilot that just processed its first transaction. Meanwhile, Acculynk, the processor whose technology is supporting Accel/Exchange’s pilot, says two other networks (NYCE and one unnamed) have agreed to implement its PIN debit system, called PaySecure. Interchange pricing hasn’t yet been firmly established during this pilot, but some observers believe that it will fall somewhere between brick-and-mortar PIN debit and signature debit.
Investment bank Oppenheimer & Co. predicts credit card issuers will reduce credit card lines by $2.1 trillion in the next 18 months, wiping out nearly 45% of the spending power U.S. consumers now have on credit cards. Some analysts believe that consumers will be pushed to use other payment methods beyond credit cards, especially for online purchases. Will we cover this topic in the April issue of Credit Union tech-talk - subscribe now.
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Internet Access
Officials at Ixia, an IP test systems supplier, say their IxLoad Voice solution is “the next generation in residential and business VoIP testing.” They say that their IxLoad tests VoIP network components, including IP-PBXs, softswitches, call managers, session border controllers and media gateways with realistic scenarios involving multiple voice protocol, complex calling sequences, and triple-play mixes of voice, video and data traffic.
Alteva does not run their VoIP service over whatever network you happen to use, such as broadband DSL and cable networks designed for simple data transfer rather than live, real-time voice, but instead has built a network specifically for high-quality business VoIP phone service. They provide an IP PBX replacement service for organizations that average 50 employees to thousands of employees. Their hosted platform is in place in 48 states and nine countries.
Baton Rouge-based Transformyx is positioning their RallyPoint platform as the first end-to-end crisis recovery and communications system. The service is designed to handle a wide range of data: text, voice, video, and even communications from government agencies. All employees are given a card they can carry around that provides instructions on how to use the system which provides them with a way to check in, notify managers of their whereabouts, and similarly, gives those managers the information they need to know about the group of people they are responsible for. Employees and managers alike can upload messages to the system. Plus, any two members using the system can communicate with each other once they've signed in. Managers using the system can use up to 1GB of storage for documents or video.
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Call Centers
According to Datamonitor, sales of the "IP convergence" voice portal technology surpassed those of traditional IVR systems some time in 2007. A voice portal replaces the once-proprietary vendor IVR box in a legacy contact center system with software developed in Java, PHP, or .Net that sits on a standards-based application server and accepts commands from a special server-based voice browser, which in turn receives pages back from the application server in a standard called VoiceXML. Some experts say that a typical voice portal call resolved without an agent runs between 25 and 50 cents, depending on whether speech recognition is used. IT Departments also enjoy lower support costs, especially when you consider that voice portals should not require any major changes to your existing phone systems, be they TDM- or IP-based.
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Conferences
Catch Tom and Bill Rogers, Associate Editor of Credit Union tech-talk at the following conferences in 2008:
April 6-8, Park City - 2009 MVi Users Conference
June 4-5, Lake Las Vegas - Credit Union InfoSecurity Conference
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