Articles by Paul A. Greenberg

By all accounts, the much-ballyhooed concept of online banking is still struggling to assert itself. In fact, according to a recent report by research firm eMarketer, about half of all customers who sign up for online banking cancel the service While online banking has struggled, online credit cards have done relatively well. Online Visa card provi...

With no predictable resolution in sight, the Microsoft antitrust trial is scheduled to hear closing arguments in Washington, D.C. today Meanwhile, in Chicago, Illinois, private settlement deliberations continue, although people close to both sides indicate that a settlement is not imminent.

Despite claims of readiness for the Valentine's Day shopping rush by many leading e-tailers, Internet performance monitoring firm Keynote, Inc. has found that many of those sites failed to live up to expectations For example, ProFlowers.com told the E-Commerce Times before the holiday that it was "100 percent certain it could meet demand." However,...

U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno told the U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, State and Judiciary Wednesday that cracking down on cybercrime is "one of the most critical issues that law enforcement has ever faced." In a hearing titled "Cybercrime," Reno said, "I would simply say that we are taking the attacks very seriousl...

Controversial Internet advertising agency DoubleClick, Inc. disclosed Wednesday that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has launched an inquiry into its methods of gathering and using information about online consumers Earlier this week, DoubleClick announced a public relations initiative, including an advertising campaign with 50 million banner im...

With an eye toward making online bill paying the norm rather than the exception, Internet billing and payments provider CheckFree Corp. announced Tuesday that it has forged a deal to buy TransPoint in a stock deal valued at well over $1 billion (US$) To acquire TransPoint -- which is owned by First Data Corp., Microsoft Corp. and Citibank -- CheckF...

Japanese electronics giant Toshiba Corp. announced a $2.3 billion (US$) initiative Monday that will target electronic commerce and Internet content businesses The three-year investment will create i-Value Creation, a new arm of the company that is scheduled to debut on April 1st. The unit will focus on Internet-related services in the areas of fina...

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Department of Justice, U.S. Postal Inspection Service and National Association of Attorneys General have banded together with other government agencies to aggressively seek out and prosecute perpetrators of online auction fraud The new Internet fraud initiative was unveiled Monday, on the first day of Nation...

Online toy giant eToys, Inc. disclosed last week that it has become the subject of a Federal Trade Commission (FTC) probe into its business practices In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Santa Monica, California-based company stated that the FTC is conducting its inquiry "to determine compliance with the FTC's Mai...

Despite the recent barrage of hacker attacks on high profile e-commerce sites, online shoppers have continued to buy products and services -- albeit more cautiously -- over the Internet For those e-tailers that experienced a denial-of-service (DoS) attack, it may have been fortuitous that Valentine's Day was just around the corner. Many U.S. consum...

This week's denial-of-service (DoS) attacks on high profile Web sites such as Yahoo!, eBay and Amazon.com have the potential to translate into future profits for companies that offer protective online services such as insurance and security software In the evolution of electronic commerce, insuring e-tailers and associated businesses against unpred...

At a summit meeting in Washington, D.C. this week, the three largest commercial insurance trade associations in the United States called upon the government to refrain from erecting regulatory barriers to insurance e-commerce and recommended 12 principles to be followed in its regulation of the industry Despite having accepted the fact that regulat...

The six electronic commerce business members on the Advisory Commission on Electronic Commerce (ACEC) tried yesterday to strike a compromise between deadlocked groups by urging the U.S. Congress to extend the current tax moratorium on Internet sales for five more years The businesses making the new proposal are MCI WorldCom, Gateway, Inc., Time War...

The National Governors' Association (NGA) has issued a stern call to action for U.S. states to help grow e-commerce by eliminating "the horse-and-buggy tax systems that are unsuited to the exploding telecommunications market." In a report issued Tuesday, the NGA -- citing statistics from the U.S. Department of Commerce -- said the Internet economy ...

Reports earlier this week that online powerhouse Amazon.com is being sued by individual consumers as well as being investigated by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for privacy issues are the culmination of suspicions that have been coming to a boil since late last year Late Monday, Amazon.com revealed that the FTC is investigating its Alexa ...

Last week, Motorola, Inc. (NYSE:MOT) announced plans to make a "virtual credit card" developed by Trintech (Nasdaq:TPPA) available on its lines of mobile phones. By pushing a button or issuing a voice command like "buy" or "pay," mobile users will be able to complete e-commerce transactions in seconds via their virtual cards The virtual credit card...

United Parcel Service, Inc. announced today that it has formed a subsidiary that will perform back-end fulfillment functions for e-commerce companies and also help companies develop their supply chain management operations This direct foray into e-commerce by the world's largest package delivery service -- to be known as eVentures -- comes several ...

Financial software giant Intuit, Inc. and TransPoint, a joint venture between Microsoft and First Data Corp., are teaming together to tackle one of the last bastions of paper-based commerce -- the sending of 63 billion bills yearly to small businesses and consumers The new service would allow consumers and small businesses to receive their bills on...

With an eye toward selling half of its air travel tickets online by 2003, British Airways has announced that it will cut 6,500 jobs over that three-year span Reportedly, the cuts are geared toward streamlining the operation, slashing costs and downsizing the business to jumpstart a sagging bottom line. The layoffs will shrink the current workforce ...

Despite reporting a net loss of $323 million (US$) or 96 cents a share for the quarter ended December 31, 1999, e-tail giant Amazon.com has seen its stock shoot up $9-3/16 in mid-day trading Thursday to a price of $78-5/8 The stock price was buoyed by news that the company's quarterly revenues tripled to $676 million from $253 million a year earlie...