Fintech firms accuse banks of blocking their access to customers’ account information - At the center of the PNC-Venmo skirmish is Plaid, a data aggregator that connects Venmo and thousands of other apps to financial institutions.
Fintech firms and banks have tried to find mutual ground for data sharing. Together, they formed a group called the Financial Data Exchange, which is working to promote a shift to a technology to replace a method known as screen scraping, used by many apps to access customers’ accounts by deploying their usernames and passwords.