Passengers on British Airways (BA) flights from London Heathrow’s Terminal 5 to Malaga in Spain will be the first to trial a contactless biometric check-in and boarding system that will enable them to travel through the airport and board an international flight without needing to show their passport... More
Travel and ticketing
Transport for London sets out plans for next generation transport ticketing solution
Transport for London (TfL) is planning to integrate its Oyster closed-loop transit card into an account-based ticketing system for contactless fare payments as part of a network-wide scheme to upgrade its revenue collection system, according to a call for competition issued by the transit agency’s trading arm, Transport Trading Ltd... More
Ireland takes next step towards rolling out national contactless ticketing system
Ireland’s National Transport Authority (NTA) is to launch an account-based contactless ticketing solution on Dublin’s buses as a next step towards rolling out an integrated contactless fare payment system across the country’s bus, rail and other transport networks... More
Google Wallet rolls out in Malaysia
Google Wallet has gone live in Malaysia, enabling users to store and use their credit and debit cards, boarding passes, tickets and other digital credentials on their Android NFC smartphone or Wear OS smartwatch... More
Colorado begins issuing mobile driving licences and state IDs
Colorado has become the third US state to add support for Apple digital IDs, enabling residents with an iPhone or Apple Watch to create and store digital versions of their driving licence or state ID documents in Wallet and use them to verify their identity by tapping their device at selected Transportation Security Administration (TSA) security checkpoints... More
Danish rail operator rolls out contactless fare payments on standard Android NFC phones
Denmark’s state railway operator Danske Statsbaner (DSB) has begun rolling out a software-only point-of-sale (sPOS) solution that enables rail staff to accept contactless fare payments on a standard Android NFC smartphone without needing any additional hardware or accessories... More
Translink begins rolling out interoperable fare-capped contactless ticketing across Northern Ireland
Passengers travelling on Translink’s Metro bus services in Belfast are the first in Northern Ireland to be able to pay a flat fare for their journeys with a tap of their contactless bank card and benefit from daily fare-capping using the public transport operator’s contactless account-based ticketing system... More
Three in four airline passengers want biometric ID to replace passports and boarding passes
Three in four airline passengers worldwide want to use biometric data to verify their identity when they travel rather than their passport and boarding pass (75%) in order to simplify, speed up and facilitate airport processes such as check-in, security and border control, an International Air Transport Association (IATA) survey has found... More
Contactless World Congress to explore the future of contactless payments, credentials, ticketing and beyond in 2023
Contactless World Congress will dive deep into the future of contactless payments, ticketing and credentials in 2023 with a series of five live events that explore the very latest innovations in contactless technology from across the world... More
New Zealand sets out plans for national open loop contactless transit payments system
The New Zealand government and the Waka Kotahi NZ Transport Agency have confirmed plans to launch a national account-based open loop payments system that will enable public transport users to make contactless fare payments with a new national transit card or their own physical or digital credit or debit card... More
Mississippi to let citizens use mobile IDs to prove their eligibility to vote
Voters in the US state of Mississippi will be able to verify their identity when proving their eligibility to vote in November’s mid-term elections using a digital version of their driving licence stored in the state’s Mobile ID digital identity wallet on their smartphone... More
South Korea to roll out digital national ID cards that citizens can store on their mobile phone
Residents of South Korea will soon be able to store a digital ID in an app on their mobile phone and use it to verify their identity across a wide range of use cases including accessing government services, healthcare, finance and transport... More
Queensland rolls out open loop contactless ticketing to three additional rail lines
Passengers travelling on the Caboolture, Redcliffe Peninsula and Gold Coast railway lines in south east Queensland can now make contactless fare payments with their credit or debit card, mobile phone or smartwatch using the Australian state’s open loop ticketing system... More
Shanghai launches Mobility-as-a-Service app that rewards users for choosing greener travel options
Transportation agencies in Shanghai in China have launched a Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) app that enables users to pay for their journeys by bus, ferry and metro services, book taxi rides and find and pay for parking spaces across the city from their smartphone... More
California begins rolling out support for discounted open loop contactless fare payments for older passengers
Eligible passengers aged 65 and over using Monterey-Salinas Transit (MST) buses in the US state of California will now automatically receive a discount on their fares when they tap to pay for journeys with their debit or credit card using MST’s fare-capped open loop contactless ticketing system without needing to provide any additional proof of eligibility... More
EasyCard lets consumers top up their stored value card via NFC
Consumers in Taiwan can now purchase an upgraded version of the EasyCard stored value smart payments and transit card that they can top up directly from their NFC smartphone without needing to use a reload or top-up machine at a metro station or convenience store... More
Paris Metro begins phasing out physical tickets as it moves towards completely contactless fare payments
Île-de-France Mobilités (IDFM) has begun phasing out the sale of physical tickets for journeys on the Paris Metro as the first step towards accepting contactless or mobile fare payments only... More
Korean banks partner with airports for biometric traveller IDs
Passengers travelling on domestic flights from 14 airports in South Korea can now verify their identity with their hand when checking in for their flight if they register biometric data with one of nine Korean banks and financial institutions before they travel... More
UK updates Highway Code to allow drivers to make mobile payments from their vehicle
The UK government has published an updated version of The Highway Code governing the use of public roads that incorporates a clause permitting drivers to make a contactless payment at a contactless payment terminal from their vehicle using their mobile device... More
Visa reports rapid growth in contactless fare payments worldwide
Visa has processed more than 1bn contactless fare payments on transit systems around the world over a period of 10 months, signalling “rapid growth” in the uptake of digital payment options, the card network reports... More