Samsung unveils Galaxy S6 with NFC and LoopPay mobile payments

Samsung Galaxy S6
FLAGSHIP: Galaxy S6 will include Samsung Pay, which will go live in the US “this summer”

Owners of Samsung’s new Galaxy S6 flagship phone will be able to make mobile payments at merchants equipped with both legacy magnetic stripe card terminals and those with contactless POS terminals, Samsung boss JK Shin has revealed. Samsung Pay will go live in the US and Korea “this summer” and in other areas, including Europe and China, at a later date.

Samsung Pay combines NFC, tokenization, Samsung’s Knox security platform, fingerprint biometrics and passcodes with the magnetic secure transmission (MST) technology developed by LoopPay and acquired by Samsung in February.

The inclusion of MST in the Samsung Galaxy S6 means that owners will be able to make mobile payments at “most” card acceptance points in the US. The 10% or so that won’t support Samsung Pay include those that require the card to be fully dipped or where the device takes the card. Some proprietary solutions will also not support the service.

Adding a card requires a few simple steps, says the phone maker. Once added, the user simply swipes up from the bezel to invoke the Samsung Pay app, chooses the desired payment card, and authenticates with the fingerprint sensor. Tapping the device to the point-of-sale terminal concludes the transaction.

“From the start, Samsung’s vision for mobile payments and commerce has been centered on security, wide acceptance and a simple user experience,” Dr Injong Rhee, executive vice president at Samsung Electronics explains.

Samsung Pay has the potential of being accepted at about 30 million merchant locations worldwide, making it the only mobile payment solution with near universal acceptance.

Samsung has partnered with MasterCard and Visa and is working to expand the ecosystem for Samsung Pay with key financial partners globally, including American Express, Bank of America, Citi, JPMorgan Chase and US Bank.

MasterCard’s Digital Enablement Service (MDES) token platform, launched in September 2014 to support the introduction of Apple Pay, will be used to enable the customers of participating banks to make mobile payments with their credit and debit cards “directly through Samsung Pay”, the payments network says.

“Samsung Pay leverages industry-standard cryptography-based protections to ensure transactions can take full advantage of one of the most secure payments technology in the world,” MasterCard adds.

“Mobile commerce just got a lot more interesting,” says Visa’s Jim McCarthy. “Combining Visa’s expertise in payment technology with Samsung’s leadership in creating innovative mobile experiences gives more choice to financial institutions who want to enable their customers to pay by phone.”

Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge
EDGY: The Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge, unveiled at Mobile World Congress 2015

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3 comments on this article

  1. Go Samsung, go … but, I don’t know about “LoopPay” though, sounds a bit “loopy” to me; then, we must not forget, most retailers In the U.S. are still living in the “Stone Age” as far are payment terminals are concerned …

    1. loop pay uses the existing MSR terminals that are already in place for any merchant that swipes a magnetic card

  2. In Loop Pay, they provide external accessory to register the card. Magnetic stripe information will be retrieved when user swipe the card using additional accessory. In Samsung pay, how user will register the card ?

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