With the growing popularity of smartphones and other internet enabled handheld devices, most businesses and service providers are now exploring the online provider to connect with their customers and providing their services. With customers demanding online services and smart tools to manage their banking transactions and finances on the go, most banks are getting into the arena of online banking.

Experts like Global Chief Operating Officer John Ferraro E&Y,senior advisory partner for some of Ernst and Young's most important global accounts, feel that online banking is here to stay and banks need to develop their online services to offer complete freedom and accessibility to their customers.

Internet banking or online banking allows customers associated with financial institutions to go through various transactions on secure websites maintained and managed by the institutions. Virtual or retail banks, credit unions, building societies and many other financial organizations are coming forward to provide various banking services to their clients. It is common to find people using their mobile devices and computers to access their account information, secure loans, transfer funds to third parties or withdraw cash from remote locations.

It is important to note that one of the most important aspects of online banking is the high ended security provided to the sensitive financial information of clients. Newer technological inputs and integration of more sophisticated software application into the existing systems are helping financial institutions succeed in obstructing unauthorized access to online banking accounts of their customers. Clients no longer hesitate to login into their online banking accounts for credit card transactions, online payments for purchase of goods and services or transfer money to overseas customers or family members.

Customers, individuals and business are benefiting in more ways than one with more and more banks and financial institutions offering online banking facilities. Well, convenience is undoubtedly the biggest advantage which lures clients. Online banking also serves to be a great money saver and proves to have better integration and practice value in their life.The innumerable services connected with online banking are available 24/7. This means goodbye to long queues, rush of banking hours and travel time needed to reach the branch. With smart phones, connectivity and other technological features dominating business and private lives, the mobility meted out by online banking takes proper care of most banking needs.The lower transaction fees, higher interest rates, ready accessibility to accounting information and the power to control operations at fingertips is making online banking a popular option for many.

The list about the advantages is indeed endless. Online bankers should try to maximize their benefits by understanding the various virtual banking services for best results. Online banking is here to stay and customer should look forward to using its varied and secure features in every possible way.

San Francisco based Presidio Bank has come out with an innovative solution – called IronKey Trusted Access – to safeguard its customers against the threat of cyber crimes related to ACH, wire transfer and online banking. This Trusted Access prevents identity theft, online takeover of bank accounts, and frauds arising from making online payments. The unique solution also complies with the guidelines levied by Federal Financial Institutions Examinations Council (FFIEC) to minimize the risk involved in online banking leading to frauds.

Trusted Access solution is so powerful that it would guard online banking transactions even if the client's computer system is attacked by various viruses and malwares and they go undetected by anti-virus or other software. Whenever the bank customers start online banking, Trusted Access initiates a protective shield of virtual operating system and a secured web browser which is safe from any crime-wares on the computer system. This secured browser would only work with IronKey's Trusted Network and other sites which are approved by bank. According to a Gartner study, secured browsing is the most critical element of security to prevent any online banking fraud.

For this innovation, Western Independent Bankers Association has awarded the Presidio Bank with the "Innovative Community Bank" for the year.

Online banking frauds have forced banks to take extra measures to tackle the same. The response has been such that online banking customers are left wondering if the banks have approached the issue in a rather crude manner.
'Secure keys' handed out by HSBC to its online banking customers generate a new key each time you use it, and now with more people going the online banking way for money transfer and the like, the responses too are many. Online banking customers feel that the method makes online banking rather cumbersome and time-consuming.
Many irritated online banking customers are venting out on twitter etc, but they should also look at the fact that online banking frauds still cost around $50 million annually.

Wells Fargo & Company has been awarded for their online banking services for the second consecutive year. They have been awarded the "Best Consumer Internet Bank" and "Best Corporate/Institutional Internet Bank" for online banking in the United States.
These awards for online banking by Global Finance magazine are a part of the 12th annual "World's Best Internet Banks" competition in the US. The magazine also gave its awards to Wells Fargo & Company for the best among consumer internet banks for online deposit, Credit and Investment Product Offerings, Bill Payment & Presentment, Information Security Initiatives and Social Media. The online banking firm also bagged the honors for "Best in Trade Finance Services" and Mobile Banking.
According to Jim Smith, Executive Vice President and head of Wells Fargo's Internet Services Group, they have endeavored to provide an unrivalled online banking experience for its clients since 1995. They have 19.3 million active online clients and 5.9 million active mobile clients who are an important part of the bank's success as their feedback is taken into consideration while designing the services.

Hong Leong Bank recently launched its new banking service called Hong Leong Connect with a target to attract more customers and expand its online banking base. The Bank is looking forward to add as many as 130,000 to 480,000 customers by the end of the financial year i.e. June 2012.
The online banking head of Hong Leong Bank, Ken Yong, revealed that the bank has 350,000 online banking customers, however only 40 percent of the customers logged in to Hong Leong personal monthly while around 20 percent were occasionally logged in.
Considering the fast moving online banking trend, Hong Leong Bank has upgraded its information technology platform. The bank has also launched mobile banking applications which work on various Smartphone operating systems. Hong Leong Bank is amongst the top three online banking service providers in Malaysia.

TopTenReviews.com has reviewed some of the best online stock trading brokers of this year. optionsXpress has been ranked as number one in the top online stock trading brokers category. Barron's, Forbes, Kiplinger's and Smart Money have all recognized optionsXpress as the best in online stock trading. The only disadvantage is that it does not have any international or FOREX trading options. This online broker offers flat rates, has no minimum balance requirements and has been reviewed as having powerful trading tools. OptionsHouse has been rated as the second best online trading broker. This online stock trading broker is committed towards client education, offers a flexible and reasonable fee structure, and is continuously refining its software trading platform. TradeKing has .been given the third position in this category and offers a wide range of free tools for stock screening and monitoring.

Liberty Bank has chosen Fiserv Premier bank platform to handle their account processing, online banking, electronic document management, and bill pay solutions. The architecture of Fiserv Premier is agile and efficient in helping banks to collect data from multiple sources, and allowing staff and customers real-time access to that information. It also will help Liberty to rapidly deploy new solutions as it's business evolves, and it's open integration should allow for compatibility with other bank software and systems.

Liberty has also chosen to use other Fiserv products including Retail Online (formerly eCom) to support internet banking, Mobile Money for mobile banking, WireXchange for wire transfers, and CheckFree RXP for bill pay. AccountCreate, which lets consumers open and fund accounts online, is already in use by the bank.

Now banks in USA will have better security when it comes to online banking. They have been asked to improve their online banking security by banking regulators or the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council1 (FFIEC). This has keep up after an update in the code of guidance to banks (2005). The FFIEC has strengthened online banking security with the onslaught of the predatory environment.
This has happened after there has been flurry of security breaches in small companies and banks; as a result of that there have been many issues amongst banks and their customers. Now the council asks banks to strengthen the online banking security and moving beyond the simple "device identification " which uses multiple cookies and resort to using one-time cookies. Banks are not asked to just rely on one kind of software to strengthen their online baking security but such processes that will help them detect problems and frauds.
Banks also need to assess their software and come up with regular updates to tackle the online banking security issue. The US Government has also asked companies related to finance to step their security.

StockTradingToGo.com has listed some of the top online brokers. Some of these online brokers are known for their award winning customer service whereas others are known to offer inexpensive or even free stock trades. ETRADE was ranked as the number one Online Broker of 2011. This online stock broker offers trading at all times, and anywhere with Etrade Mobile Pro; Power ETRADE Pro offers world class trading tools. Thinkorswim was rated number one in the Online Broker 2010 category by Barron's. This online stock broker offers one of the best trading platforms for active traders and in 2010 was also rated as 'best for frequent traders' and 'best for options traders' by Barron's. TradeKing is another amongst the best online stock broker category. It houses the Trader Network, which has more than 200,000 investors

Online banking also formerly known as internet banking or electronic banking is something which everybody might have heard about. Gone are the days when one still pays one's bills at the bank branch and other centers. People prefer more to work with bankers rather than opting for online banking as they trust them.
Online banking makes use of today's computer technology and saves a lot of time and energy which is wasted in traditional banking. Today's generation has become more computer and internet savvy; as it prefers the option of online banking. The people working in the banks view online banking as a powerful aspect which attracts new customers helping to discard costly paper handling. Nowadays, national banks, regional banks and even smaller banks provide the option of online banking.