Financial giant Mastercard has released a new program that allows biometric payments and retail venues. Users could pay for goods and services just with their faces or hand. This could be the first step towards the development of payment infrastructure for the metaverse. More news on the GBC Time website.
The program launched by the MasterCard allows retailers to offer biometric checkout, such as:
- Facial recognition;
- Fingerprint scanning.
At the venues with this technology, shoppers can pay by just showing their face or the palm of their hand. This will allow making store payments seamless and quick.
It also means more opportunities for the development of Metaverse payments. MasterCard’s head of cyber and intelligence Ajay Bhalla says that the company is currently working toward the metaverse. Bhalla says that eventually, people will be able to link their non-fungible tokens with their biometric identity.
Who can use this program?
The program is already available in five St Marcher grocery shops in the Brazilian capital – Sao Paulo. Mastercard plans to launch the program globally later this year. The company wants to bring biometric payments to the US, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.
By the end of 2025, the company expects 1.4 billion to use facial recognition for payment purposes, compared to 671 million in 2020.
How to use it?
To take advantage of MasterCard’s biometric payments program, you have to take a picture of your face or scan a fingerprint and register with an app. You can do this on your mobile device or via a payment terminal. Then, you add a payment card and it gets linked to the biometric data.
Safety concerns
Some people raised concerns about data privacy and how MasterCard collects the info. The company, however, says that all the information in the system is encrypted so user privacy could not be compromised. The biometric data is replaced with a token and linked to your credit or debit card. The company also crafted a set of standards for data protection.
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