Apple Pay For the UK

An anonymous reader writes about when Apple Pay will be available in the UK. "A major UK bank's concern over data collected by Apple Pay is reportedly stalling negotiations to launch the mobile payments service in the country by 'the first half of 2015.' The Telegraph reports that 'at least one' of the UK's biggest banks is 'uncomfortable with the amount of personal and financial information Apple wants to collect about its customers.' Apple has been adamant about its approach to collecting users' data via Apple Pay. 'We are not in the business of collecting your data,' said Apple exec Eddy Cue when introducing the service in September. 'So when you go to a physical business and use Apple Pay, Apple doesn't know what you bought, where you bought it, or how much you paid for it. The transaction is between you, the merchant, and your bank.'"

Comments

if not collecting the data

[Anonymous Coward]

If Apple is not in the business of collecting personal data, and don't know what you bought or for how much, then why do they require your information from the bank?

Re:if not collecting the data

[Anonymous Coward]

Who says they do? We're sitting staring at an article in which a reporter says that someone else says that a bank says that Apple wants your data.

The reporter has an ulterior motive in that they want to sell newspapers and keep their job
The someone else has an ulterior motive in that they want to be paid for their story from the newspaper
The bank has an ulterior motive in that they don't want Apple getting a foot hold in the banking sector, so they will try to attack Apple's core message.

Until someone actually says what this data that Apple is supposedly collecting is, and shows where and how they're collecting it, I call bullshit.

Re:if not collecting the data

[penix1]

At the risk of getting modded to oblivion, I consider Apple Pay the same as I consider Google Wallet. It is like broadband availability in that it will be predominately a big city thing. In rural areas like where I live I don't see it working. Hell, I saw my first Apple Pay commercial this holiday season and even the bigger stores such as Walmart in my area doesn't have the receivers for this. It simply requires too much involvement from too many entities to be feasible everywhere. First, the buyer has to have confidence in the tech and more importantly the security of that tech. We aren't there yet. Second, it requires the merchant to install the receivers which are costly and again, the trust that it will be secure has to be there. Lastly, it requires the cooperation of the bank to honor payment requests from the receivers.

Again, this may work in larger cities but in the vast majority of rural America I don't see it.

Re:if not collecting the data

[rsborg]

I consider Apple Pay the same as I consider Google Wallet. It is like broadband availability in that it will be predominately a big city thing. In rural areas like where I live I don't see it working

Except Apple Pay is expressly designed to prevent what Google Wallet does - which is to correlate your purchases to a credit card. It even prevents the merchant from such correlation. Google Wallet does it differently - they issue a virtual card that, while protecting your CC number from the merchant, still allows you to be correlated by Google. Apple is simply implementing EMV payment tokenization - it's a standard [1].

The only company who retains this is the credit card issuer, who will have to authorize such payments and maintain the credit balance (which you're not going to get away from without going to decentralized trade systems like bitcoin, and even then the block chain retains payment details - it's not anonymous).

Between Apple Pay and cash, I can remain relatively protected against my personal information from being stolen by some retailer's crappy security model (I still have to worry about the CC issuers but I'll take what I can get). I also don't feed Google's insatiable desire to index me.

Re:if not collecting the data

[TheSunborn]

Is it a standard us thing, that a merchant get access to any card data when the customer pays with a credit card in a physical shop?

Here in Denmark, a normal merchant newer has access to your card data even if you pay with a credit card.

The data is sent directly from the credit card terminal(The hardware which read the card and card code) to dibs/nets(The payment gateway for credit cards) which then reserve the money and sends a message back to the terminal about the status of the transaction. This transaction status is then send to the merchants cash register to together with the last 4 digits of the credit card number.

Re:if not collecting the data

[zenaida_valdez]

"It's not a matter of having to run new lines out to the boonies - if they take credit cards, they can likely accept NFC payments."

Wrong.

Like most small businesses, ours takes credit cards, and the reader is connected to the dialup fax line. Swipe the card, enter a number and... wait until it dials, Beep Boop Beez Buzzzzz it sounds like a 14,400 modem in there. Takes about 30 seconds, assuming that the fax line isn't busy. Not a problem when you only swipe a few dozen a day, but the whole point of the shiny flashy phone is that you tap and go. We're not going to invest in the infrastructure to save our clients 30 seconds once a week.

Re:if not collecting the data

[davester666]

This is slashdot. I haven't even read the whole title of the article.

Re:if not collecting the data

[BasilBrush]

How many more years do you imagine you'll be relying on a 1980s/90s standard data line? In most of the developed world consumers would be in an uproar of they didn't have more than 1 Mbps (A)DSL. And you're running a business on a dial-up line?

Don't imagine your backwoods experience is any limitation on the majority.

Bank wants data

[danomatika]

Maybe the issue is really that the BANK wants that data and Apple isn't giving it to them ...

Re:Bank wants data

[Anonymous Coward]

Entirely plausible actually. The banks may well want a bunch of transaction information that Apple is unwilling to provide.

They just don't like to share

[MPBoulton]

"The Telegraph reports that 'at least one' of the UK's biggest banks is 'uncomfortable with the amount of personal and financial information Apple wants to collect about its customers'."

The bank is clearly appealed at the thought of someone else having as much customer data as the bank itself. The banks use this data to target their other products (credit cards, mortgages) at the right customers and clearly don't want Apple getting ideas about setting up their own financial products and having the data to do so profitably.

Re:They just don't like to share

[Cederic]

The bank is also heavily regulated and obliged to cover customers' losses to fraud and responsible for identifying money laundering activity.

Apple are.. not.

Typical "Big Lie"

[Thagg]

What the banks are really concerned about is not that Apple is collecting information, but that their customers will realize the opposite -- that using Apple pay is far more secure than other systems. If people start waking up to the fact that all of the information merchants are getting from credit cards can and will be used against them; then systems like Apple Pay are going to destroy the status quo.

What better way to try to stop this then by spouting a Big Lie? The banks are saying that they are worried that Apple is collecting too much information. If they can seed doubt into customers for long enough, then they may succeed in killing it.

Re:Typical "Big Lie"

[SJ]

No. The quote was "...the amount of data...". See how they don't specify if it's too much or not enough.

I'm guessing the later. The Banks want MORE data, but Apple's system doesn't allow for it.

Re:Typical "Big Lie"

[Thagg]

Do you honestly believe that the banks are selling credit card info, and that apple isn't sharing any of that info with anyone?

I don't know if the banks are selling credit card info; but I know that merchants are. Apple Pay prevents them from doing that, which is one of the big reasons that so many merchants in the US have stopped using NFC for payments, as this earlier Slashdot story describes.

A friend of mine was deeply involved in NFC payments at significant companies (not Apple) and says that not only is Apple not sharing the info; they can't. It's just not available. The NFC chips in the phone don't send out identifiable information.

Amount could be reduced, not increased...

[SuperKendall]

."It is understood the bank is uncomfortable with the amount of personal and financial information Apple wants to collect about its customers. "

Do realize that they could be uncomfortable because the amount of data Apple wants to collect is greatly REDUCED from what credit cards collect - the statement does not state which direction of the amount goes.

Re:Amount could be reduced, not increased...

[MitsuMirage]

Apple wants to collect NO information, an amount the banks find untenable. They, of course, run big data analytics on all their customers to target new products.

Re:Amount could be reduced, not increased...

[houghi]

Not sure about the UK, but in Belgium what the Credit Card Company collects is:
Merchant. This can be a store in city A, while the transaction is done in the headoffice in city B.
Transaction number, because the merchant is not allowed to store the credit card number.
Time and amount.

In Belgium it is not even allowed to do an analysis of the data to do e.g. a directed offer where you say "I see you buy a lot online"

As the collected data is basically to assure a good transaction and followup on that transaction, I would not know why they would be worried to get less information.

What they most likely are worried about is that Apple takes more information then is allowed and that, if they play along, they are at risk to loose their licence or at least pay a very heft fine.

I do work with these types of companies and they are not happy if partners want to go above and beyond the law when it is about consumers.They will make it very, very clear that they do not agree with the practice, so that when (not if) a lawsuit comes, they can proof they did not had any hand in the practice.
Apple has been shown not to care about European (or any other) laws and they do not want to be dragged along.

Remember that Europe is more on the side of the people then on the side of companies. Especially when compared to the USofA.

Based on the headline

[fibonacci8]

My first thought was "How much did Apple pay for the UK?" They can probably afford it at this point.

Re:Based on the headline

[Paradise Pete]

FWIW, Apple's stock is worth more than the entire Russian stock market combined.

Negotiation tactic nonsense; real reason buried

[Anubis IV]

As the summary said, negotiations are ongoing. The fact that these claims are showing up right now and fly in the face of everything we've previously heard regarding Apple Pay seems to suggest that they are nothing more than a feeble attempt on the part of the banks to gain some better leverage in the negotiation process. They're hoping for outrage. Unfortunately, the only ones who give a crap about this stuff (i.e. us) are the ones who also know that Apple Pay is differentiating itself with its lack of collecting information.

As for why they'd want more leverage, the real reason is buried in the article:

The Telegraph also notes that some banking executives fear that Apple Pay could serve as a "beachhead for [Apple's] invasion of the banking industry."

Which is to say, the UK banks are concerned by the rapid uptick of Apple Pay in the US, are beginning to realize that it's gaining real traction, and are worried that it could be the means by which Apple establishes a toehold in the financial industry that allows them to begin exerting the sort of influence they have in other non-technology industries (e.g. music).

Re:Negotiation tactic nonsense; real reason buried

[Anubis IV]

I didn't miss the story. I read it, in fact. It only mentioned Apple in passing as one of the members of the trade group in question, but because Apple makes for news, their name was plastered in the headline and summary on Slashdot. Meanwhile, the AC who responded to you pointed out that Apple took alternative practical steps to protect their user's privacy years ago, given that DNT was never an effective method to begin with.

Anyway, I too would likely trust UK banks over Apple...when they're willing to speak publicly, on-the-record, in clear language, as Apple did when it made its claims regarding how Apple Pay operates. But when negotiations are ongoing, any sort of off-the-record statements from unnamed sources claiming to represent one of the sides involved should always be assumed to be an attempt on their part to gain the upper hand. Given that that's what we're dealing with here—an unnamed source representing one of the sides, making unsupported claims while negotiations are ongoing—we shouldn't read anything into it, beyond that Apple is probably playing hardball and the banks feel a need to push back.

As for whether or not Apple is tracking users, they absolutely are. No doubt. They even admit as much in their terms of use/service for various things, such as iAd. But as the AC pointed out, Google and other companies are in a whole other league when it comes to tracking users (including illegal practices that resulted in fines from the FCC, such as the incident the AC referenced). Apple definitely tracks users, but in much more clearly defined ways (e.g. they publish white papers over exactly what data they collect, how they collect it, why they collect it, how they protect it, how they organize it, and for how long they keep it) that are much more limited in scope than their competitors.

Let's not lump them in with Big Data just yet.

Yesss! We already are working on this in UK

[DerekShadowalker]

I'm doing development for Seglan so I suppose that we have the system that will work in UK and rest of Europe for payments with mobile phone. And it's certified!!!

Our system is based in tokenization, like the one provided by Apple Pay, and already signed by major banks and issuers. So we are working hard to make it 'the market standard'. And of course, always open for business. But in our case we don't collect almost any data. Just neccessary for payment requirements, and geolocalization if agreed.

Seglan is a company that's on payment market for so long and provided already solutions for payment chip cards for all major banks. Some of them even doesn't know that Seglan is providing its core infrastructure. Cause we are small group of engineers that can make products evolve fast!!! :D

Please feel free to ask if you want more information.