FIELD

The disclosed systems and methods relate to financial transactions. More specifically, the disclosed systems and methods relate to financial transactions in which three entities are actively engaged in authenticating a transaction.

BACKGROUND

Conventional financial transactions utilize numbers that are assigned to cards or other payment devices (e.g., fobs), then to banks, and finally to a consumer. These numbers and their keys (card verification codes) are easily stolen and manipulated. The infrastructure supporting these financial transactions was developed and built on technology from half a century ago and has not substantially evolved.

Additionally, the financial transactions involving these number-based payment devices are linear transactions that only occur between two active participants: the merchant and the financial institution. For example, when a credit card is used to pay for merchandise, the merchant transmits the credit card information to the issuing bank, which approves or declines the transaction based on a status of the account of the party presenting credit card. However, a single transaction may pass through 3 or more systems for validation. Merchant processors, aggregators, card association systems, and other systems may process data along the way, but do not take part in the authorization of the transaction. Instead, these intermediaries merely add unneeded complexity, unnecessary cost, increased processing time, and an increase in risk for a given transaction.

SUMMARY

In some embodiments, a financial transaction method includes receiving a request to perform a financial transaction at a financial institution, generating a single-use transaction key for the financial transaction, and storing at least a first portion of the transaction key in a storage medium. The transaction key is transmitted to a user that requested the financial transaction, and an authorization request including at least a second portion of the transaction key is received from a merchant. The second portion of the transaction key received from the merchant is compared to the first portion of the transaction key to determine if the transaction should be authorized. An authorization message is transmitted to the merchant if the second portion of the transaction key received from the merchant matches the first portion of the transaction key. The financial transaction is funded from an account of the user if the financial transaction is authorized.

In some embodiments, a financial transaction system includes a non-transient computer readable storage medium, an engine for generating a substantially random alpha-numeric string, and a processor coupled to the non-transient computer readable storage medium and the engine. The processor is configured to cause the engine to generate a single-use transaction key in response to receiving a request to perform a financial transaction from a user having an account with a financial institution, cause at least a first portion of the single-use transaction key in store the single-use transaction key to be stored in the non-transient computer readable storage medium, and cause the single-use transaction key to be transmitted to the user. The processor is configured to determine if at least a second portion of the single-use transaction key received from a merchant matches the first portion of the single-use transaction key stored in the non-transient computer readable storage medium, and cause a message to be transmitted the merchant authorizing the financial transaction if the second portion of the single-use transaction key matches the first portion of the single-use transaction key.

In some embodiments, a non-transient machine readable storage medium is encoded with program code, wherein when the program code is executed by a processor, the processor performs a method. The method includes causing a single-use transaction key for a financial transaction to be generated in response to receiving a request to perform a financial transaction from a user having an account at a financial institution, causing the single-use transaction key to be transmitted to the user that requested the financial transaction, comparing a second portion of the single-use transaction key received from a merchant to a first portion of the single-use transaction key stored in the non-transient computer readable storage medium to determine if the transaction should be authorized, and causing a message to be transmitted the merchant authorizing the financial transaction if the second portion of the single-use transaction key matches the first portion of the single-use transaction key.

