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UN says 800,000 people have fled Rafah as Israel kills dozens in Gaza
Israel says it recovered remains of one captive while Hamas claims several attacks against Israeli troops across Gaza.
Israel’s Gantz demands Gaza post-war plan, threathens to quit gov’t
Netanyahu rival lays out six-point strategy, including forming an international coalition to help govern Gaza after war.
Russian court seizes two European banks’ assets amid Western sanctions
Freezing hundreds of billions of dollars in lenders' assets was part of dispute over gas project halted by sanctions.
At least 23 people missing off Tunisia coast, authorities say
Search and rescue operations under way while five suspects have been arrested, Tunisian National Guard says.
Georgia’s president vetoes controversial ‘foreign agents’ bill
President Salome Zourabichvili says the law is 'Russian in its essence', but parliament is expected to overturn veto.
Vietnam nominates public security minister to be new president
To Lam has been public security chief since 2016 and has taken a hard line on human rights movements in the country.
Three Afghans, three Spanish tourists killed in Bamyan shooting
Group of tourists and their companions was fired on while walking through a market in central Afghanistan.
Violent protests rage in New Caledonia amid growing civil unrest
France’s Pacific Islands territory has been rocked by riots for nearly a week over planned electoral reforms.
Are seed-sowing drones the answer to global deforestation?
Drones are being used to replant degraded areas of forest in Brazil - how successful have they been so far?
Slovak PM Fico in ‘serious condition’ as shooting suspect appears in court
Court near Bratislava is considering prosecutor's request for pre-trial detention of accused in assassination attempt.
Sri Lanka’s killing fields cast a long shadow
Impunity for crimes committed during the civil war has fuelled post-war repression in Sri Lanka.
Israel’s PR battle is getting harder
Eight months into the war on Gaza, disunity and disarray is making Israel’s PR and messaging much tougher.
Death toll rises to six in New Caledonia riots as unrest spreads
Hundreds of heavily armed marines and police patrol the French territory's capital Noumea after a night of violence.
At least 50 killed in heavy rains, floods in Afghanistan’s Ghor province
Officials in the central region expect the number of casualties to increase as rising waters destroy thousands of homes.
Zelenskyy warns Russia’s Kharkiv offensive may only be ‘first wave’
President says Ukraine has a quarter of air defences needed to hold front as Russia advances along northeastern border.
School asks for prom donations as pupils struggle
A Gwynedd school makes an appeal as it looks to support pupils who cannot afford the celebration.
Lebanon’s economic crisis endures, as does the EU’s ‘fear’ of refugees
Analysts question whether EU grants to Lebanon have anything to do with getting its economy out of the hole it is in.
Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 814
As the war enters its 814th day, these are the main developments.
Changes from Visa mean Americans will carry fewer credit, debit cards
new york — Your wallet may soon be getting thinner.
Visa on Wednesday announced major changes to how credit and debit cards will operate in the U.S. in the coming months and years.
The new features could mean Americans will be carrying fewer physical cards in their wallets, and will make the 16-digit credit or debit card number printed on every card increasingly irrelevant.
They will be some of the biggest changes to how payments operate in the U.S. since the U.S. rolled out chip-embedded cards several years ago. They also come as Americans have many more options to pay for purchases beyond "credit or debit," including buy now, pay later companies, peer-to-peer payment options, paying directly with a bank, or digital payment systems such as Apple Pay.
"I think (with these features) we're getting past the point where consumers may never need to manually enter an account number ever again," said Mark Nelsen, Visa's global head of consumer payments.
The biggest change coming for Americans will be the ability for banks to issue one physical payment card that will be connected to multiple bank accounts. That means no more carrying, for example, a Bank of America or Chase debit card as well as their respective credit cards in a physical wallet. Americans will be able to set criteria with their bank — such as having all purchases below $100 or with a certain merchant applied to the debit card, while other purchases go on the credit card.
The feature, already being used in Asia, will be available this summer. Buy now, pay later company Affirm is the first of Visa's customers to roll out the feature in the U.S.
Fraud prompts changes
Some of Visa's new features are in response to online-payments fraud, which continues to increase as more countries adopt digital payments. The company based in San Francisco, California, estimates that payment fraud happens roughly seven times more often online than it does in person, and there are now billions of stolen credit and debit card numbers available to criminals.
Other new elements are also in response to features that non-payments companies have rolled out in recent years. The Apple Card, which uses Mastercard as its payment network, does not come with a printed 16-digit account number and Apple Card users can request a fresh credit card number at any time without having to dispose of the physical card.
Visa executives see a future where banks will issue cards where the 16-digit account number, if the new cards come with them, is largely symbolic.
Soon, fingerprints can approve transactions
Among the other updates unveiled by Visa are changes to tap-to-pay features. Americans will be able to tap their credit or debit cards to their smartphones to add the card to mobile wallets, instead of using a smartphone's camera to scan in a card's information, or tap the card to their smartphones to approve a transaction online. Visa will also start implementing biometrics to approve transactions, similar to how Apple devices use a fingerprint or face scan to approve transactions.
The features will take time to filter down to the banks, which will decide when or what to implement for their customers. But because the banks and credit card companies are Visa's customers, and issue cards with the Visa label, these are features that the financial institutions have been asking for.
‘Refuge of the last dreamers’: Luang Prabang, a city suspended in time
Once a royal city in ancient Laos, Luang Prabang is home to Buddhist temples nestled in a valley on the Mekong River.