Australia's Advance Bank Promises Christmas Ecash 10/25/96

["Joseph M. Reagle Jr." <reagle@rpcp.mit.edu>]

>Date: Mon, 28 Oct 1996 13:20:02 -0500
>From: reagle@rpcp.mit.edu (Joseph M. Reagle Jr.)
>To: reagle@rpcp.mit.edu
>Subject:  Australia's Advance Bank Promises Christmas Ecash 10/25/96
>
>
>  	  				 
>SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA 1996 OCT 25 (NB) -- By Stuart Kennedy, Computer Daily  
>News. Come Christmas, electronic cash should begin jingling around the 
>Australian side of the global Internet. The Sydney-based Advance Bank 
>has signed on for Netherlands-based DigiCash's "Ecash" system and 
>expects to be issuing Australian denominated Ecash by the end of the 
>year. 
>
>The deal puts Advance a further step ahead of its Australian rivals in  
>the Internet-based banking transaction game. Most other Australian banks 
>are still dabbling with information-only Web pages while Advance has 
>been offering its customers Internet-transacted account information, 
>account transfers, bill payments and now Ecash. 
>
>It also makes Advance the first bank in the Asia Pacific region to  
>employ an Internet-based digital money system and Australian currency 
>the fourth in the world to get the digital treatment, DigiCash claims. 
>
>Other DigiCash licensees are Mark Twain Bank (US), Deutsche Bank  
>(Germany), Merita Bank (Finland) and Posten (Sweden). 
>
>"We would like to see more than one Australian bank take up the system.  
>We have been talking to other (Australian) banks, " says DigiCash 
>Australia's managing director, Andreas Furche, who has also had chats 
>with the Australian Reserve Bank over the implications of Ecash for the 
>Australian economy. 
>
>The big task for Advance (and affiliate BankSA) is convincing merchants  
>to sign up for the new electronic cash system which could catalyze an 
>Australian online economy. 
>
>This week Advance's Web pages were already featuring electronic sign-up  
>forms for merchants. The bank has yet to finalize transaction charges 
>for the system, but costs should be lower than the credit card 
>transactions currently used for most Net-based retail commerce. 
>
>Digicash established its Australian operation in March. The corporation  
>claims the Ecash system provides transactions that are as secure and 
>secret as interbank transactions. A user draws money from an account 
>and stores it in software as "Ecash." When a purchase is agreed, Ecash 
>transfers electronic "coins" from the PC, sealed into an electronic 
>"envelope" which goes to the nominated bank for authentication. 
>
>The bank cannot see the details of the transaction. Once authenticated,  
>the payment goes to the payee, who receives a credit. 
>
>(19961025)   	
>  	   	
>
>
_______________________
Regards,          What we hope ever to do with ease, we must learn first to do 
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