UK bank NatWest is to introduce the trial of a new biometric fingerprint scanner technology for NFC card payments. This trial will begin in April and will contain 200 consumers. It will let its participants make contactless payments without requiring to enter a PIN or offer a signature. When the fingerprint is used, the standard £30 limit will not apply for the contactless payments.
Currently, everyone can make a contactless payment in Britain by tapping their cards on the terminal to make all the payments. Due to this lack of security, the standard limit £30 is applied to payments, with retailers needing you to swap your card into the card reader and need to enter a PIN for most expensive purchases. While mobile payments need authentication, consumers often find they are subject to the standard £30 limit.
In this new technology, all the fingerprint data is saved locally on the card, means there are no security data for a hacker to be a steal from the bank’s central database. It is not confirmed, there is always the risk that thief can imitate and steal your fingerprint, but it is more secure than s PIN that thief can steal by simply looking as you enter it.
Fingerprint authentication has become a secure and important component of NFC payments. However, the owner of the card usually needs to visit the bank rather than making payments themselves from home with mobile payments such as Google Pay or Apple Pay.
Britain’s bank NatWest doesn’t overcome such problem. Customers in the trial need to visit a bank. A video created by Gemalto stated that it hopes the upcoming version of the payment system will let customers use their own mobiles to register their fingerprint.