If you have a hard time remembering your credit card’s
four-digit PIN, there is good news for you.
MasterCard has unveiled its first
payment card with biometric fingerprint scanner. Instead of requiring its owner
to enter a four-digit personal identification number (PIN), it features a small
area that can verify the card user’s fingerprints. Much of our devices that we
use on a daily basis now use biometric fingerprint scanners for authentication;
so it makes sense that credit and debit cards also adopt this technology to
make our lives simpler.
MasterCard has introduced the payments card in South Africa,
following successful trials with a local bank and retailer. It is currently
extending the trials and plans to fully introduce the technology this year, as
well as bringing the fingerprint sensor cards to Europe and Asia. MasterCard’s
chief of safety and security, Ajay Bhalla, said that the fingerprint technology
would help “to deliver additional convenience and security. It is not something
that can be taken or replicated.” The card with the biometric sensor is
surprisingly not thicker than a regular credit card. The fingerprint sensor is
a small, thumbnail-sized rectangle that sits at the top right corner, and is
easily accessible when you stick the card into a payment terminal. But the
biometric verification can only be used for in-store purchases.
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