Tap to Pay — Translink — “On May 22, our card readers will accept contactless Visa and Mastercard credit cards and Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Samsung Pay. For customers without Compass Cards, this new feature will mean no more ticket line-ups, digging for exact change, or worrying about pre-calculating zones. You can tap a contactless Visa or Mastercard credit card or mobile-payment method on card readers to pay your adult, cash fare. Note: card readers will not accept debit cards.”
Challenger banks add location-based payments to mobile apps
UK banks are trying out location-based P2P payments — Tearsheet — “On Friday, Revolut introduced a feature called ‘Near Me’ which lets its customers find other Revolut customers using the same feature and send them money without knowing their contact details. On Monday, Monzo rolled out a capability called ‘Nearby Friends’… When the user opens Nearby Friends, Monzo generates a token representing the user through its API, which is then sent to Google Nearby through Bluetooth on the user’s device to ‘broadcast’ it to other Monzo apps within a 90-foot radius.”
Google Pay update to provide users with a single view of all their transactions
Google Pay’s app adds boarding passes, tickets, P2P payments and more — Techcrunch — “In an upcoming update of the Google Pay app, we’re going to allow you to manage all the payment methods in your Google account — not just the payment methods that you used to pay in-store… And even better, we’re going to provide you with a holistic view of all your transactions — whether they be on Google apps and services, such as Play and YouTube, whether they be with third-party merchants, such as Walgreens and Uber, or whether they’re transactions you’ve made to friends and families via our peer-to-peer service.”
Google Pay adds support for NFC tickets and boarding passes
Google Pay gains support for event tickets and boarding passes — VentureBeat — “Companies that integrate with Google Pay’s API — such as Ticketmaster — can enable their customers to save tickets directly to their phone by hitting the ‘Save to phone’ button after the checkout… Instead of having to open the Google Pay app or scan QR codes, fans will be able to simply hold their phone up to an NFC reader at the check-in to gain admission.”
Google includes biometric prompt API in Android P
What’s new in Android P Beta — Google — “Apps can use the new BiometricPrompt API instead of displaying their own biometric auth dialogs… In addition to supporting fingerprints (including in-display sensors), it also supports face and iris authentication, providing a system-wide consistent experience.”
Phoenix reports drop in number of US consumers making use of Apple Pay, Google Pay and Samsung Pay
“Not just Apple Pay, but the two other major third party contactless wallets, Google Pay (formerly Android Pay) and Samsung Pay, are tracing a slow but definite descent in adoption among smartphone owners”, research conducted by Phoenix Marketing International has found... More
Google releases SDK for securing applications with TEEs
Introducing Asylo: an open-source framework for confidential computing — Google — “Asylo is an open-source framework and SDK for developing applications that run in trusted execution environments (TEEs)… Previously, developing and running applications in a TEE required specialized knowledge and tools. In addition, implementations have been tied to specific hardware environments. Asylo makes TEEs much more broadly accessible to the developer community, across a range of hardware — both on-premises and in the cloud.”
Google Pay begins to roll out on the web
5 ways Google Pay can save you time and money at checkout — Google — “We’re starting to roll out Google Pay on the web from desktop and iOS — which means you’ll start seeing it when you’re shopping on browsers like Chrome, Safari, and Firefox, no matter your device… Once you’ve added a card to Google Pay, you won’t need to enter your payment info again — even when you’re checking out in an app or on a site for the first time. And if you’re checking out on Chrome, Google Pay can automatically fill in your billing, shipping, and payment info, so you don’t have to bother with forms.”
ANZ reports 156% increase in mobile payment volumes
ANZ sees dramatic uptake in digital wallet payments — iTnews — “ANZ Bank customers made almost A$600 million in mobile payments during the first half of fiscal year 2018… Customers completed more than 18.5m mobile payment transactions in the half, an increase of 156% on the previous corresponding period. ANZ said the transactions were made from mobile wallet services from Apple, Samsung, Google, Fitbit and Garmin, as well as the bank’s own Mobile Pay service.”
Google’s mobile payments app has now been installed 100m times
Google Pay hits 100m installs on the Play Store — Android Police — “100m is impressive, but it may not be nearly as impressive as you’re imagining. For instance, Google Pay uses the same Play Store listing and APK pname (com.google.android.apps.walletnfcrel) as Android Pay, which Android Pay continued to use from Google Wallet. Additionally, Google Wallet/Android Pay/Google Pay has been pre-installed on quite a few devices.”
Google Pay expands support for transit ticketing cards to Portland
Google Pay now supports Hop Fastpass transit tickets in Portland, Oregon — Android Police — “To use Google Pay to pay for transit in Portland, users must first download the Hop Fastpass app and add money to create a virtual card. Once the virtual card is set up, holding your phone up the reader will work the same as with a regular Hop card.”
Google to take its Tez mobile wallet app global
Google’s Indian payments platform looks for new markets — Financial Times — “Diana Layfield, head of Tez and vice president of Google’s Next Billion Users initiative, told the Financial Times that Google had drawn up a shortlist of three Asian markets and one other emerging market country for Tez’s next launch… Tez initially looked across Latin America, the Middle East and Africa… Countries with “similar characteristics” to India — relatively low credit card penetration and limited access to near field communications systems — were the most attractive to Tez.”
Google Assistant adds support for voice-based payments
Now the Google Assistant can take care of your IOUs — Google — “Starting today, you can ask your Google Assistant to pay your friends back with Google Pay… You can easily send or request money from your contacts — for free — using the Assistant on Android and iOS phones in the US. In the coming months, you’ll be able to send money on voice-activated speakers like Google Home… To get started, just say ‘Hey Google, request $20 from Sam for the show tonight’ or ‘Hey Google, send Jane $15 for lunch today.’”
Google Pay adds support for Mifare public transportation tickets
NXP’s Mifare 2Go and Google Pay transform public transportation — NXP — PARTNER NEWS — “Combining Google Pay with the security, flexibility and scalability of Mifare products, this solution serves as a catalyst for the mobile transit experience, as it will be available for any consumer equipped with widely-available Android phones that support Near Field Communication (NFC)… The first deployment of this solution went live today with the Las Vegas Monorail.”
Google expands support for wearable payments to Canada, Spain, and Australia
Google Pay on Wear OS officially spreads to three new countries — Android Police — “In addition to using NFC-equipped watches to make regular mobile payments, users in Australia can use their Wear OS devices with the Opal ticketing system to pay for single-trip tickets on select rail and ferry lines… Formerly, Google’s payment service was only supported on Android Wear (now Wear OS) devices in the US and the UK.”
Android P to include support for GlobalPlatform Open Mobile API
Previewing Android P — Google — “Android P adds an implementation of the GlobalPlatform Open Mobile API [OMAPI] to Android. On supported devices, apps can use the OMAPI API to access secure elements (SE) to enable smart card payments and other secure services. A hardware abstraction layer (HAL) provides the underlying API for enumerating a variety of secure elements (eSE, UICC, and others) available.”
Google to let users send money directly from their Google Contacts app?
Google Contacts adds ability to send money via Google Pay Send — Android Police — “Back in November, Google added money transfers to Android Messages via Google Wallet (now known as Google Pay Send). We noticed some strings in our teardown of the Google Contacts app last week that suggested the same addition would be coming soon, and it’s now hit at least one reader in Canada.”
Google to work with European banks on PSD2 opportunities
Google says it is looking to partner with banks, not be their rival — The Irish Times — “Florence Diss, head of commerce partnerships for Google in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), said the company is actively working with a number of banks to explore opportunities arising from the payments services directive 2 (PSD2)… Ms Diss’s comments come as Google joined with KBC Bank Ireland at Finovate to demonstrate the latter’s mobile app, which allows users to open a current account in less than five minutes using a selfie for identification purposes.”
Google adds chat feature to Tez mobile payments app
Google integrates chat option on Tez payments app — Economic Times — “Google has integrated a chat option in the Google Tez application and is slowly rolling it out to its 13.5 million active users, taking the competition directly to WhatsApp… The payment application which runs on the Unified Payments Interface railroads will now allow consumers to not only send money to each other but also open up an option for conversation around the transaction.”
Google to add NFC to its Tez audio QR payments platform
Google pay app Tez to add ‘tap n pay’ option — The Times of India — “Users of Google’s Tez will soon be able to load their cards and enable ‘tap and pay’ in the payments app. The internet giant also plans to make Tez payments available for other Google products as well, which means that users in future will be able to make payments through email and see shops accepting Tez on Google Maps.”