This past Monday Apple rolled out the highly anticipated Apple Pay, advertised as “Your wallet. Without the wallet.” You may be wondering exactly how Apply Pay works, and if it is really safe to use…here is what we think:
How does Apple Pay work?
Once your credit or debit card is on file in the Passbook app (which comes with an iPhone 6 or 6 Plus) you are ready to shop. Your iPhone will pop up a “pay with Touch ID” message when its shortwave wireless transceiver is close enough to a card reader at a checkout counter, then all you have to do is enter your Touch ID as if you were unlocking your iPhone.
Check out this demo video by Tech Crunch:
After you load your credit or debit card information to your Apple Pay account, Apple does not actually store your account information on their servers, only on your iPhone. Therefore, the only way someone can use your credit card to make a purchase from your iPhone is if they have the exact same finger print as you.
Safety of Apple Pay
As a second safety measure, Apple uses a system called, “tokenization” when you add your credit or debit card to your Apple Pay account. Tokenization generates and assigns a random account number to your iPhone, rather than using your actual account number. When you use Apple Pay to make a purchase, Apple sends that random account number, rather than your actual account number, through the store’s system . Apple does this to help you avoid becoming a victim of security a breach like the ones at Target and Home Depot. In a sense, Apple Pay is more secure than using a physical credit or debit card.
Banking and Apple Pay
Apple Pay works with most of the major credit and debit cards from the top U.S. banks, including:
- American Express
- Visa
- Mastercard
- Captal One
- Citi
- Bank of America
- Chase
- Wells Fargo
Over 220,000 stores accept Apple Pay (find out which ones on Apple’s website).
Monday’s roll out of Apple Pay came along with a few speed bumps (as we all expected). Many Bank of America customers complained that they were double-charged for items purchased with Apple Pay. According Bank of America spokeswoman Tara Burke, “All duplicates will be refunded. We apologize for the inconvenience and are correcting this immediately.” Another issue that customers, specifically CitiBank members, came across was loading their cards to the Passbook app. However, experts quickly resolved this issue.
SolutionBuilt: Atlanta’s Leading App Builder
Here at SolutionBuilt, we are very excited about the launch of Apple Pay. Not having to using a debit card and risk your account being hacked is a huge bonus!