Amazon wants you to pay with a selfie
US online retail giant Amazon has reportedly filed a patent application which would enable customers to pay for its merchandise by taking a selfie.
According to the “selfie pay” patent application, Amazon said that the technology would improve customer security and is safer than facial recognition software.
It argued that the latter software “can often be spoofed by holding a picture of the user in front of the camera, as the resulting two-dimensional image can look substantially the same whether taken of the user or a picture of the user”.
“While many conventional approaches rely on password entry for user authentication, these passwords can be stolen or discovered by other persons who can impersonate the user for any of a variety of tasks,” Amazon’s application said.
“Further, the entry of these passwords on portable devices is not user friendly in many cases, as the small touchscreen or keyboard elements can be difficult to accurately select using a relatively large human finger, and can require the user to turn away from friends or co-workers when entering a password, which can be awkward or embarrassing in many situations.”
According to Sky News, the application was filed last October, but was only published recently.
It noted that MasterCard is already rolling out a selfie-based payment technology.
The payment firm is piloting a project that would see 500 customers using images of their face instead of typing in their own personal passwords when paying using their smartphone.
A recent global study conducted by Moody’s Analytics, commissioned by Visa, found that increased use of electronic payment products, including credit, and prepaid cards added $296 billion to global GDP over a five-year period.
The study found that electronic payment products also raised household consumption of goods and services by an average of 0.18% per year.
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