“Apple’s 2014 roadmap was laid out in pretty considerable detail by KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo earlier this week in an investor note, and while ordinarily analyst predictions aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on, Kuo has a solid track record of actually getting things right,” Darrell Etherington reports for TechCrunch.
“Among Kuo’s predictions are larger iPhones, a Retina MacBook Air, improved Apple TV, iPad with Touch ID and iWatch launch later this year,” Etherington reports. “But one small detail could have more potential impact than all the rest: NFC inclusion in iWatch and iPhone devices.”
“While Apple now offers iBeacons [sic] Bluetooth LE-based tech, which could replicate the payment functions of NFC, support for the other tech would mean broad compatibility with existing hardware that more and more merchants have now been adopting with their in-store point-of-sale systems,” Etherington reports. “The WSJ reported earlier this year that Apple was looking to develop a mobile wallet for iPhone, using the existing iTunes accounts the company already uses for purchases within its own software and retail store ecosystem. That would give Apple an instant network of over 600 million users with credit card information on file, making it likely the largest mobile payments network of any kind without even trying.”
Read more in the full article here.
This sounds dubious to me. Hasn’t apple always been against NFC and looking to create it’s own BluetoothLE solution?
Agreed.
Then again, maybe the NFC solution would be a 6-step P.I.T.A. solution for those cro-magnon merchants who refuse to upgrade systems, while the iBeacon solution would be the seamless answer that people will prefer and increasingly insist upon.
If both were available could be better, perhaps, than if there were only one way.
Maybe.
NFC has poor security so if Apple is able to guard it with TouchId (i.e. must select the appropriate NFC code since the device will store code for multiple cards, maybe NFC dongles used for access control; then enable it using TouchId (or password) => NFC enabled for short period only).
This way people cannot passively scan your NFC codes and use your credit cards without your permission as they can with current NFC credit cards and dongles.
Even security issues aside, there is no need for NFC since Bluetooth 4/LE exists. Thanks to the latter, iPhone do not need be have stupid tech kiss exercise that NFC device owners have to, and still have the same service (depending on how much use scenarios are developed).
It’s the same diff between the two, only one has the cell phone using a single communication method [bluetooth], while the other has two [bluetooth and NFC].
But it seems like there will be a round of hardware upgrades happening soon, as there is a push now for chipnpin cards instead of magstripe due to the extremely poor level of security used during the entire payment process.
But for me, I still don’t understand the crazy push for wireless payment transactions like this. I would much rather have a physical card, just to eliminate the ‘oops, there was a bug in the implementation, so everybody walking by some location got hacked’.
Indubltably
Too many rumors by too many techtard writers.
Apple has to bow down to the dominance of Android.
I’m still yet to meet a single person who uses NFC on their Android phone.
Android doesn’t move market, Apple’s iPhone does .
Do they have to keep flogging this dead horse with these rumours?
If Apple didn’t use NFC when it was actually crawling up out of the swamp it came from (just barely) why would they use it now that it’s sinking back down for the final time?
ok….here is the thing. Fandroids have been bragging about their devices (that turn them into einsteins) HAVING NFC. And this thing does wonders for them by doing NOTHING. Untill Apple leads the way none can do shit. Others in the likes of Shameshung, Google can start shit. Apple starts, others copy.
Kuo has a good track record but I hope he’s wrong on this one. There’s a reason developers refer to NFC as nobody f@#!ng cares. merchants never got on board with it and even Samsung admitted it was a flop (a rare moment of honesty). It’s possible Apple has another use for it unrelated to payments.
If they haven’t committed by now and instead introduce a system that would be far superior and could do oh much more regards it seems highly unlikely that they would do so now when it is increasingly looking like a temporary dead end solution. This sounds like the Bluray argument all over again which was far more compelling and no complete replacement available just an alternative solution to a similar end i.e. downloads. iBeacons on the other hand will be far better and a single solution to do so much more and probably not too far in the future. Equally where Apple goes others follow and most Android phones are already capable of doing so.
F*K NFC. It’s a dangerous FRAUD.
I hope this, ahem, ‘analyst’ is blowing out his gas hole.
Kuo certainly has been extremely gaseous of late. I think he’s attempting to impress someone or push for a raise by way for his gaseous emissions.
BTW: The deliberate LIE that NFC would have prevented the Target et al. catastrophic robbery of customer accounts has NOT abated. Please do NOT believe this lie. NFC does NO A THING to prevent the POS (point of sale) device infections that continue to plague the retail industry. The flaw is specifically the ability to hack into active RAM memory where customer data is kept IN THE CLEAR. IOW: It amounts to being yet another damned WINDOWS XP security hole. In this case it is a minimal, embedded version of XP.
The ONLY solution, the ONLY future free of account hacking is End-To-End encryption. Until then, ignore all the lies to the contrary. They’ve being perpetrated people attempting both SPIN and short term profit off their customers knowing full well that these POS devices will continue to ruin the retail industry until they are made to be fully encrypted.
/rant
I’m sorry to rant but IASSOTS and can’t help but yell about what’s really going on.
NFC has it’s place, but that place is different to what iBeacons BT system would be used for. While implementation here in the UK has been glacially slow, an NFC based system for public transport is being run out in various cities, London’s Oyster Card is very popular, and a way of merging the various transport cards into one universal travel app on an iPhone would be hugely advantageous for commuters. I live a hundred miles from London, but I use an Oyster Card when in the city.
Also, some retail outlets are installing NFC contact points by their tills, and those are spreading, so being able to integrate that system onto one device, instead of several cards would be ideal.
No it woooonnnn’tttt!
Apple will use iBeacons, Bluetooth, and WiFi so it doesn’t have to add additional power-draining chips to its phones.
Why would Apple begin using NFC now? That technology’s profile has only decreased in the last year, and they’ve already invested in their BLE initiatives.
When are they going to put an embedded projector in their phone?…Samsung tried, but not very good.