Carte Bleue, the French bank card association, is licensing technology from France Telecom - Orbiscom (FTO), a new joint venture company established to promote the uptake of disposable credit card numbers in online transactions.
Carte Bleue is the first organisation to license FTO's technology, making it available to the 23 million consumers and business customers of its member banks. Based on Orbiscom's Controlled Payment Technology, 'Cartes Virtuelle Dynamic' will allow customers to generate a unique disposable 16 digit number for each merchant transaction and select the transaction limit, expiration date and specific merchant site for use.
Experts from France Telecom's R&D institute in Caen along with key personnel from international subsidiaries Orange and Wanadoo, are working in conjunction with Orbiscom to further develop its patented controlled payments technology for use by ISPs and in mobile markets.
Alain Barrere, managing director of FTO, comments: "By working with Orbiscom, we can not only deliver secure payment protection to French consumers through their bank card issuers, but also make secure payments through wireless and mobile devices a reality."
Orbiscom says card issuers who have tried its technology record an increase of up to 60% in the average online transactions of customers, with over 62% of people who use the technology becoming repeat customers.
The agreement with France Telecom follows a recent deal with Microsoft aimed at delivering Orbiscom's technology via the desktop.