iPhone users will be able to make Visa mobile payments in retail stores, at fast food restaurants, in taxis, during sporting events (such as at baseball games), and also make purchases at vending machines that have contactless payment terminals. Thousands of merchants throughout the U.S. have already upgraded their payment terminals to allow consumers to make Visa mobile payments. The technology will also work with a majority of smart phones that have a slot for a memory card. By simply inserting the card into the memory slot on their phone, mobile users can transform their existing mobile phones into a Visa payment device. Visa has already rolled out a similar technology in Malaysia and Japan, where consumers can make mobile payments in stores and restaurants.
The mobile payment application can be password protected and utilizes advanced security technology to uniquely identify each contactless transaction.. In addition, all Visa mobile payments are backed by Visa’s global processing network and analyzed for potential fraud in real-time. If a mobile device is lost or stolen, account holders should contact their issuer, as they would if their card was lost or stolen. The issuer can immediately deactivate the account. Market trials of the payment-enabled iPhone are scheduled to start this summer.
Source: Visa and DeviceFidelity
MacDailyNews Take: The quote below grows ever eerier:
This device, able to be made today with current technology, would easily be “The Device.” Running Mac OS X or a mobile variant, it would allow the user to communicate via text, audio, and video. It would snap digital photos and organize them, do email, and browse the web. It would sync automatically with your desktop or portable Mac…. It would absorb the iPod by playing AAC / MP3 audio and interface with iTunes, but it would also play feature-length MPEG-4 movies, too, in full color… McDonald’s Drive Thru’s would accept payments via Bluetooth from “The Device.” And, of course, it would have the basics like any PDA; your date book, to do list, calculator, etc. I figure a form factor about the size or a Newton or a bit smaller would do the trick. This would be “The Device.” iDevice?? And only Apple, in concert with a partner like Verizon, Cingular, or Sprint, has everything in place to make “The Device” a reality today. I wonder if they are close, yet, or still far away from fruition? I really hope they are building it. Everything seems to point to it or am I just wishing too hard? I’ll tell you one thing, if Apple can produce it, they’ll really change everything this time, and they’ll never be able to make enough. Nearly everyone would have an Apple device in their pocket… – SteveJack, MacDailyNews, December 10, 2002
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dirty Pierre le Punk” for the heads up.]
I don’t mind the concept, but the implementation sounds like a deal-breaker, as this relies on a chip inside a special case for your iPhone. How lame is that?
Now that will be nice!
MDN: No shit sherlock : )
Now I just need a digital copy of my driver’s license on my iPhone and I don’t need to carry around a stupid wallet. I can’t wait to dump my wallet, just have my tricorder – I mean iPhone – with me.
I’m not interested in a special case for my phone, either.
I’ll wait for version 2.
breeze,
Note the date of the quote referenced in the MDN Take.
Now apologize to MDN and bow down before SteveJack like the rest of us mere mortals.
Perhaps this year’s rev will have the chip built in.
Unbelievable:
I was in jest, unbelievable huh?
For the SteveJack dream to come true, Apple needs to expand to all major carriers. They are tied to AT&T;and I cannot tell you the number of times I’ve heard “I would get an iPhone if it was on Verizon/T-Mobile/Sprint.” Differences in technology between the major carriers or the lame talk and data at the same time argument. If Apple wants this device to explode even more than it has, get it out there!
Apple doesn’t need to be any where near the hacker issues this can and will bring!!
Maybe I can take stevejack to the racetrack with me…
@Mac Daddy
A Delorean and a flux capacitor will also accomplish what you’re looking for.
I wave my private parts at your aunties, you cheesy-leather, second-hand, electric donkey bottom biters.
Special case? Stupid.
Bummer of an implementation.
As with cptnkirk, I really hope the existence of this case doesn’t rule out an rfid (that’s what it is isn’t it?) chip in the next iphone – because I’m not putting any stupid case on it.
@ zmarc–
They specifically state that this case is for the 3G, and 3GS.
There is nothing that says it can’t be built into the next gen version.
How lame a special case might be is wholly dependent upon the case. I have one of those hard, thin plastic backs that snaps on. Very unobtrusive, yet provides a decent amount of basic protection from bump and scrapes. If they molded their chip into something like this, I’m in. The problem is a chip means power draw, and that means either a battery or a connection thru the iPhone port. These would seem to rule out “unobtrusive”.
I agree about the case constraints. I am very interested in the square (up) app when it is available for iPhone, so I can take payments that way. But, certainly, there is a simplicity in being to pay via iPhone if the technology is reliable. Given that I can’t reliably pay for gas when I smash the wavy thingy into it sometimes, I will wait.
And all those poor Android, etc. users will have to remove their SD card to use this service.
Memory capacity or Visa payments. Which do you want?
“combines a protective iPhone case with a secure memory card “
Bzzzzzzzzt! Fail.
Gotta be software or built in. I simply won’t pocket a fatter, wider, or longer iPhone.
This is all great and all but I’m concerned about the security aspects of this technology.
At the moment to read your card you have it’s chip of mag strip physically place in a reader to get your cards information. With these new contactless cards how close do they need to be to the reader to read the data on them? What is to stop someone from having a reader in a small bag or case, wave it next to your pockets and read the info from it? On the Tube (subway) would provide the ideal opportunity to get close enough.
I believe it uses RFID, that would make it have to be very close to the device to use. I see card readers all over the place, but don’t know any one who has a card to use it. Just what I need, a new way to make my money disappear faster
the mdn charade gets errier too every day. stop the bs. mdn is steve jack. there is now we or us. come out of the dark jack.