GNU Taler begins operating in Switzerland, distributed by the Taler Operations AG. Gnu Taler aims to be a “digital wallet” and has been used by the swiss national bank as well as the european national bank as a example for how a digital currency handed out by the state could work. It aims to be as privacy preserving as cash for the buyer while not allowing the seller to evade taxes.
Currently the Taler is brought out by a special organisation, the “Taler Operations AG”, and not the national bank, although both the national bank as well as the Taler Team have shown interest in a official digial currency by the national bank based on the Taler. But we need to relativate as the national council has stated that the introduction of a digital currency would probably take relatively major legislative changes and therefore take a bit of time.
Well, I suppose they have to permit third party payment processors on their network or they’d face regulatory trouble. Here in EUrope, card interchange fees are regulated.
But, in case you haven’t heard about this, Visa has a subsidiary called “Cybersource” which offers payment processing for all mayor credit cards. So it’s not like Visa wasn’t trying to get into payment processing as well.
@hendrik @vga
https://www.cybersource.com/
Thanks. I didn’t know about that. I mean everytime I do online shopping or have a look at eCommerce solutions, I see other payment processing providers. Or like SumUp other other company’s terminals with smaller shops. I always wondered why the banks disregard that. I mean they’re in the loop anyway. They could just take that chunk of profit as well. And the processing fees add up, even here in Europe. And I don’t think I’ve ever seen cybersecure for checkout anywhere I bought stuff.