The ways in which players deposit funds into online gaming accounts is changing. Our payments feature seeks out the latest developments.
THE online gaming industry continues to move at an astonishing rate; no sooner do we adjust to some bold new innovation than another comes along. The industry snaps at the heels of technological advancement, eating up new products and ideas and utlising the best of them to maximise opportunity.
And yet the way players pay for bets, the means by which they transfer funds from their old-fashioned bank account or credit card to their account with an operator, has for many hardly changed.
Typing in credit or debit card details is the 21st century equivalent of picking up the phone and giving someone the “long number on the front of the card.” It’s safe, -ish, and secure enough although the clumsy adjunct of entering the CVC code – the three digits cunningly hidden in plain view on the back of the card – hints at the fragility of the old-school system. Technology leaps ahead and the ways to bet and to play become ever more convenient and responsive. Reaching for the wallet or purse and fishing around for a card may seem a minor inconvenience but it is very much the old way of doing things. By simply introducing into the process the card and its all-too-easily forgotten number combinations presents unnecessary risk in many situations.
This feature centres on that fraud risk and, most importantly, the possible solutions already at hand. Virtual currencies are high on the list, with bitcoin the shimmering if mercurial poster boy for cryptocurrencies everywhere. Contributors from Cubeia, Domicilium and SoftSwiss come from different angles but all feel bitcoin has a future in one form or another. But there are many alternatives to both virtual currency and good old plastic. Prepaid cards are one, direct mobile billing is another.
DMB is a stunningly simple but cunningly astute way to open up a whole new means to pay and play. Infobip is a proponent of DMB and iNTERGAMINGi caught up with Paolo Rizzardini, the company’s vice president for mobile payments, to dig a little deeper.
Read the full article in the latest issue of iNTERGAMINGi
