The UK’s NatWest bank has begun a three-month pilot of a biometric credit card that enables customers to make contactless transactions of up to £100 (US$123) instead of the usual maximum value of £30 (US$37)... More
The number of passengers able to use the NFC transit ticketing system which went live in Paris in September is to be increased in 2020-21 with the addition of support for host card emulation (HCE)... More
A new digital identity service to be introduced by the French government this year will use NFC passport reading to enable citizens to use their smartphone to securely enrol themselves onto the system... More
Samsung Pay users in the US are now able to send international money transfers from within the mobile payments app — and use a new Samsung Pay Cash account to make payments in stores and online “right from the Samsung Pay app”... More
PARTNER NEWS: Chipmaker NXP has updated NFC TagWriter, its Android app that can write and rewrite information such as contact data, web links, WiFi and Bluetooth connection details, as well as triggers for emails, calls, text messages, apps and more, into single or multiple NFC cards and tags... More
Keep up to date: Get NFCW's headlines by email every Wednesday
A new store in the largest shopping and entertainment complex in North America has opened as a testbed for the latest retail technologies — and products on sale have been equipped with NFC tags... More
Face-scanning metro check-in and payment launched in central China — Xinhua — “Zhengzhou Metro in central China’s Henan Province has ushered in the face-scanning era, as a new check-in and payment system based on facial recognition was launched on Friday… It is the first face-scanning metro check-in and payment system in the country launched along a full metro line, providing passengers with a better experience of quick pass access and automatic ticket buying.”
There are now more than 200 million users of the UnionPay mobile payments app, the China-based payments network reports, and more than 3m merchants outside mainland China now accept UnionPay mobile payments... More
In depth: The fight for dominance in China’s mobile payment market — Caixin Global — “Under the plan, by the end of 2021 all merchants will be able to use one universal barcode to facilitate transactions through different payment service providers, including banks, Alibaba’s Alipay and Tencent’s WeChat Pay. Currently, payment providers issue different barcodes that can be used only on their own services.”
Amazon is in talks to bring its cashierless Go technology to airports and movie theaters — CNBC — “Amazon is in talks to bring the cashierless technology that runs its Go stores to other retailers like airport shops and movie theatres, according to people familiar with the matter… The idea is to start installing the technology working for customers in the first quarter of 2020 and have hundreds of these stores working by the end of 2020, two of the people said. One person said Amazon hopes to have the upgrade process take just two weeks.”
Visa, Mastercard, others reconsider involvement in Facebook’s Libra network — The Wall Street Journal — “Visa Inc, Mastercard Inc and other financial partners that signed on to help build and maintain the Libra payments network are reconsidering their involvement following a backlash from US and European government officials, according to people familiar with the matter.”
Mexico’s Cobro Digital national mobile payments platform — known as CoDi — is now live across the country, enabling consumers to make NFC and QR payments via their mobile banking app and letting merchants receive funds instantly with no commission charges to pay... More
Keep up to date: Get NFCW's headlines by email every Wednesday
The German government is using the NFC contactless chip reading capabilities now available on Apple iPhones in a new iOS app that lets citizens securely identify themselves to a range of online service providers by reading their contactless national ID card with their smartphone... More
Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) has launched a major initiative designed to persuade consumers to move away from paying in cash, by providing a rebate whenever they use a card or mobile phone to make a purchase at any of 500,000 merchants across the country. More
PARTNER NEWS: Cilab’s new ci230 high-speed testing suite is “a tool that has been missing for years,” Renke Bienert, senior principal engineer at NXP’s worldwide customer application and support team in Hamburg, has told NFC World... More
Russia’s PSB bank has begun the country’s first pilot of dongle-free contactless payments acceptance on standard Android NFC devices. The new SoftPOS service “allows you to turn any NFC phone running Android 7.0 (and above) into a fully fledged POS terminal,” the bank says. More
Banco Proamerica de Costa Rica has become the first bank in Latin America to let merchants accept contactless payments directly on an Android NFC smartphone, without the need for a separate card acceptance dongle... More
New York Mets fans attending games at the team’s Citi Field home field can now purchase snacks and beverages at a self-checkout kiosk that uses a biometrics-based identity verification system to process payments — and check that buyers of alcoholic drinks are of legal drinking age... More
Alipay and its local e-wallet partners now collectively serve 1.2 billion users globally, Ant Financial has revealed, up 20% since the end of December 2018 and 260% over the past three years. More
Public transportation users in Paris can now buy and store transit tickets and passes on Samsung and Orange NFC phones — and can use any Android phone to buy a ticket and then upload it to their contactless travel card via NFC... More