Biometric fingerprint-enabled NFC Payment Transaction completed
Posted by Seth Planck
August 03rd, 2011 at 12:46 PM Filed Under Latest News, Press Release, Videos
NXP, AuthenTec and DeviceFidelity Complete First Fingerprint-enabled biometric NFC Payment Transaction in the U.S
NXP, AuthenTec and DeviceFidelity have been working together to bring biometric NFC payments into reality, and that’s a good thing. The three companies joined forces to provide reference designs which are expected to help mobile phone OEMs and wireless carriers address the growing demand for NFC-enabled smartphones. The concept of using biometric sensors in phones is not a new idea and, in fact, has been trialled by AuthenTec with actual test groups as far back as 2007 using a Kyocera phone that featured a fingerprint scanner. However, this is the first time that three industry giants have come together to create a test case to show all manufacturers how to integrate at least one form of biometric security into an NFC payments phone.
The companies are fully committed to developing highly secure and easy to use mobile commerce subsystems to help ease design integration for mobile phone OEMs. Field upgradeable solutions and integrated reference designs will provide a variety of options to mobile phone OEMs for fielding mobile commerce transaction-ready platforms that incorporate biometric security.
“The payment experience demonstrated by NXP, DeviceFidelity and AuthenTec provides the convenience, speed, and security consumers require for broad adoption of mobile wallets. As the global leader in NFC solutions, we look forward to building on our leadership through collaboration with AuthenTec, the world’s No. 1 provider of fingerprint sensors, and leading pluggable payment solutions provider, DeviceFidelity,” said Henri Ardevol,Vice President and General Manager, Secure Transactions, NXP Semiconductors. “The fingerprint transaction shows how future mobile transactions may become increasingly convenient through the use of NFC and biometrics. In the meantime, however, we continue to focus on bringing easy-to-integrate yet highly secure solutions to mobile phone OEMs and carriers eager to offer secure mobile wallet designs.”
Biometrics are not new and AuthenTec are old hands at fingerprint biometric NFC payments
AuthenTec are not new to NFC payments or biometric security. We wrote a piece on the company back in May and the following is taken from that article. California-based Kyocera thought biometric sensors fit the bill and so did 87% of its trial base back in 2007 when the Earth was still warm and Jesus horses roamed the savanna. In fact, the survey, conducted by Insights Research Group, also revealed that more than 75% of testers were satisfied with their biometric NFC mobile wallet transactions and the security aspects were handled by biometric sensors embedded in their phones. Put quite simply, the phone scanned a user’s biometric fingerprint and if that print was authenticated as the owner of the phone, gave access to the NFC portion of the phone to allow the user to complete a transaction. More impressively, it did that biometric scan in just a couple of seconds. See the video below to see how seamlessly they had biometric sensors in a phone working way back in 2007.
This was achieved using Authentec, Inc. proprietary biometric sensors and code and they have developed the technology further ever since. This is one way the industry could secure our data using our own very specific biometric information. It is not new technology and could ensure unwanted guests could not access your information without your knowledge no matter where your smartphone ends up.
“Our In2Pay platform continues to create exciting new use cases for NFC based transactions, each of which aim to transform the end user payment experience. Through collaborations with NXP and AuthenTec, DeviceFidelity’s ability to offer secure consumer centric mobile contactless payment technologies for top tier issuers of NFC products is amplified,” said DeviceFidelity COO and Co-Founder, Amitaabh Malhotra. “Our jointly-created designs, including the new In2Pay microSD integration credited with the first fingerprint-authenticated mobile payment transaction in the U.S., will form the basis for the adoption of enhanced security for NFC capabilities in mobile devices.”
Fingerprints are not the only biometric technology available today
NFC phones have the potential to become the most secure form of payments that has ever existed with biometric sensors on board. A PIN number is not unique and only has so many permutations that can be used. However, your iris is unique and so are your fingerprints and so is your voice. Some may have told you before you have a unique face. Scanners are already available that can use iris, facial, voice or fingerprint, or even a combination of these technologies to secure your NFC payments phone so that only you can use it. Fingerprint scans require a new piece of hardware to be installed on a phone to allow your phone to be used in this way. Other technologies can use your phones camera and microphone to get the same job achieved. That said, a fingerprint represents a fast way for you to authenticate a payment and there have already been phones, such as the
Motorola ATRIX 4G, that incorporate fingerprint scanners. This only goes to show it wouldn’t be hard for major NFC phone OEMs to add this feature to future smartphones.
“AuthenTec has helped to make NFC-based mobile payment transactions more secure, yet easier to execute since 2004, and we are very pleased to collaborate with NFC and mobile payment leaders NXP and DeviceFidelity to create designs that will help bring a new generation of fingerprint-enabled mobile wallets to the U.S. and other regions,” said AuthenTec CEO Larry Ciaccia. “Security is often cited as the biggest impediment to the broad biometric adoption of mobile wallets, and we believe our jointly developed NFC reference designs will give consumers greater confidence that mobile wallets are not only an easier way to pay but are much more secure than other means.”
Biometric technologies have a long way to come before most NFC capable phones have solutions embedded within them. However, the parody is that biometric technology has already matured and been developed. All we are really waiting for is the OEMs to get on board and this test case may convince some manufacturers to start dabbling with the tech in upcoming NFC phones. There are privacy concerns with biometric sensors however – do you want corporations holding specific biometric information about you? Or would you feel better if the biometric data was simply held on the phone for its own access authentication to allow you to boot up a payments app? These are the questions that will continue to be asked as biometric security becomes reality and an everyday technology. Whichever way you look at it, the NXP, AuthenTec and DeviceFidelity biometric test case is a good thing.
NXP,AuthenTec and DeviceFidelity Complete First Fingerprint-enabled NFC Payment Transaction in the U.S., Jointly Collaborate on Secure NFC Mobile Wallet Solutions
August 02,2011 08:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time
Leading providers of NFC,fingerprint sensor security and contactless mobile payment technology join forces to create solutions that transform today’s smartphones into highly secure mobile wallets
Recently completed first ever fingerprint-enabled NFC transaction in the U.S. via a Motorola Android phone using technology from the three companies
EINDHOVEN,Netherlands & MELBOURNE, Fla. & RICHARDSON, Texas–(BUSINESS WIRE)–NXP Semiconductors (NASDAQ:NXPI),AuthenTec (NASDAQ:AUTH) and DeviceFidelity,Inc.,announced today that they are jointly developing reference designs that enable highly secure mobile payments via Android-based phones through the use of fingerprint biometrics and near field communication (NFC) technology. Reference designs created by the companies are expected to help mobile phone OEMs and wireless carriers address the growing demand for NFC-capable smart phones,which are forecast to grow to nearly 300 million units worldwide by 2014 according to Juniper Research.
“The fingerprint transaction shows how future mobile transactions may become increasingly convenient through the use of NFC and biometrics. In the meantime,however,we continue to focus on bringing easy-to-integrate yet highly secure solutions to mobile phone OEMs and carriers eager to offer secure mobile wallet designs.”
NXP,AuthenTec and DeviceFidelity also recently collaborated to complete the first biometrically-enabled NFC mobile payment transaction in the U.S.
The successful transaction was made possible via a Motorola ATRIX 4G smartphone equipped with AuthenTec’s AES1750 smart biometric fingerprint sensor and DeviceFidelity’s In2Pay microSD card based on NXP’s secure NFC solution. The quick,convenient and secure mobile payment was conducted when the demonstrator swiped a finger over the smartphone’s fingerprint sensor,authenticating him as the pre-enrolled account owner and quickly launching a credit card app. Following authentication the user simply tapped the ATRIX smartphone against a payment terminal to complete the first fingerprint-enabled,secure NFC transaction in the U.S. NXP,AuthenTec and DeviceFidelity plan to collaborate further on additional,similar NFC-based designs to help enable broad proliferation of mobile wallets in the U.S. and other regions.
“The payment experience demonstrated by NXP,DeviceFidelity and AuthenTec provides the convenience,speed,and security consumers require for broad adoption of mobile wallets. As the global leader in NFC solutions,we look forward to building on our leadership through collaboration with AuthenTec,the world’s No. 1 provider of fingerprint sensors,and leading pluggable payment solutions provider,DeviceFidelity,” said Henri Ardevol,vice president and general manager,secure transactions,NXP Semiconductors. “The fingerprint transaction shows how future mobilebiometric transaction s may become increasingly convenient through the use of NFC and biometrics. In the meantime,however,we continue to focus on bringing easy-to-integrate yet highly secure solutions to mobile phone OEMs and carriers eager to offer secure mobile wallet designs.”
“AuthenTec has helped to make NFC-based mobile payment transactions more biometric secure , yet easier to execute since 2004,and we are very pleased to collaborate with NFC and mobile payment leaders NXP and DeviceFidelity to create designs that will help bring a new generation of fingerprint-enabled mobile wallets to the U.S. and other regions,” said AuthenTec CEO Larry Ciaccia. “Security is often cited as the biggest impediment to the broad biometric adoption of mobile wallets,and we believe our jointly developed NFC reference designs will give consumers greater confidence that mobile wallets are not only an easier way to pay but are much more secure than other means.”
“Our In2Pay platform continues to create exciting new use cases for NFC based transactions,each of which aim to biometric transform the end user payment experience. Through collaborations with NXP and AuthenTec,DeviceFidelity’s ability to offer secure consumer centric mobile contactless payment technologies for top tier issuers of NFC products is amplified,” said DeviceFidelity COO and cofounder Amitaabh Malhotra. “Our jointly-created designs,including the new In2Pay microSD integration credited with the first fingerprint-authenticated mobile payment transaction in the U.S.,will form the basis for the adoption of enhanced security for NFC capabilities in mobile devices.”
The companies are fully committed to developing highly secure and easy to use mobile commerce subsystems to help ease design integration for mobile phone OEMs. Field upgradeable solutions and integrated reference designs will provide a variety of options to mobile phone OEMs for fielding mobile commerce transaction-ready platforms.
AuthenTec offers complete security and identity management solutions for the mobile market,including embedded security,smart fingerprint sensors and software. AuthenTec’s mobile market offering includes biometric embedded and downloadable DRM content protection,mobile VPN client solutions,security hardware IP,identity management software,and smart fingerprint sensors that are used in more than 15 million mobile phones. AuthenTec provides the most advanced levels of security,reliability,and performance for mobile phone users,mobile operators,content providers,embedded biometric security developers and many others,saving them time and money while optimizing performance.
About DeviceFidelity,Inc.
DeviceFidelity,Inc. develops plug-and-play technologies that empower a variety of institutions to deploy their services and applications on millions of mobile phones worldwide. Its patented In2Pay™ iCaisse and In2Pay™ microSD solution transform popular mobile phones into interactive contactless transaction devices. biometric Committed to bringing contactless innovation to the mobile phone,the company has numerous patents pending in both U.S. and international patent offices. DeviceFidelity is a private corporation with headquarters in Texas and offices in California,New York and London. For more information,visit www.devicefidelity.com.
About NXP Semiconductors
NXP Semiconductors N.V. (NASDAQ:NXPI) provides High Performance Mixed Signal and Standard Product solutions that leverage its leading RF,Analog,Power Management,Interface,Security and Digital Processing expertise. These innovations are used in a wide range of automotive,identification,wireless infrastructure,lighting,industrial,mobile,consumer and computing applications. A global semiconductor company with operations in more than 25 countries,NXP posted revenue of $4.4 billion in 2010. Additional information can be found by visiting www.nxp.com.
About AuthenTec
Contacts
AuthenTec
Brent Dietz,+1-321-308-1320
Director of Communications
brent.dietz@authentec.com
or
NXP Semiconductors
Michael Maader,+49 40 5613 3371
Director Communications,ID Business
michael.maader@nxp.com
or
DeviceFidelity,Inc.
Stephanie Fulqui,+1-650-587-1970
Marketing Manager
marketing@devicefidelity.com
biometric security