Paying for things on the internet is fraught with peril. Password theft is a sad reality and having your credit card details stolen is something that can definitely happen but Mastercard has plans to make authentication a little more unique. Unless you’re one of a set of twins, that is.
Mastercard is currently trialling a new biometric payment authentication system that uses your smartphone’s camera to capture your grinning mug, which will in turn get that online order heading to the depot. That’s right, selfie-centred online payments are now going to be a thing.
Users will be able, via an app, to select whether to authenticate their payments via a fingerprint sensor – if their phone has one – or by using a phone’s front camera to recognise that it’s actually you attempting to pay for some ill-considered item online. Which could make life hard for a 40-year-old Bulgarian man attempting to use a 20-year-old woman’s credit-card illegally, we’d think.
As we’ve mentioned, Mastercard’s facial authentication process is in testing right now but we expect it to reach wider release once the beta has ended.
Source: CNN