Google opens up pay-by-bonk Wallet to all credit cards Google has extended its phone-based wallet into its cloud, allowing it to claim that any credit card can now be used to pay with a bonk of the handset. The arrangement, announced yesterday in a blog posting with suitable video accompaniment, means a Google-Wallet-enabled phone can make payments using wireless Near Field …
It's because we are Troglodytes who refuse to Move With the Times, and most stubbornly refuse to hand over our personal details, bank details, and our DNA to Big Brother Google and his lesser Cousins.
We are Holding Back the Future because we care about something silly as "privacy" and should be Logan 5'd at earliest opportunity.
Failing that, a downvote is the only way they can show their Righteous Indignation at our patently profit-reducing behaviour to Uncle Google et. al. in a safe and anonymous way.
And it's not like these will be the only vulnerabilities, or the last. Sorry, but my bank card is going to be electrical contacts only, and I refuse to store it in a phone. In this case, simple is most definitely better.
Now perhaps you should explain the advantage of NFC over slotting a card in a machine, asides maybe two whole seconds?
What you have entailed is nothing more than a vulnerability in the operating system and its' interface with the technology.
It's like saying that an OS is vulnerable because the TCP/IP stack can receive malicious packets. Most of those vulnerabilities have been fixed.
The technology for NFC communication is extremely secure. Without going into too many specifics, I can say that there's all manner of anti-playback and anti-spoofing technology. Unlike a physical card, where you can use a simple keylogger to capture all track 2 data (which has the full card number, cardholder name, CVV -- everything you need to engage in CNP fraud or card duplication), the same can't be done with NFC.
Bugs in the OS != bugs in the technology.
AC for obvious reasons.
So...
Why not use electronic contacts? Why wireless? Why make it so that someone can potentially hack you by bumping into you during the rush hour? Why not just make existing Chip & PIN technology work like NFC? Insert card into slot, you can pay for anything up to £15 without a PIN. Anything over needs a PIN.
Oh yeah. It's that shiny thing, isn't it? Sorry, but simple is better in this case. If future bank cards come with RFID in them, I'll be cutting them up and sending them back.
Because as been proven, electronic contacts are no more secure. In some cases you can read them without direct connectivity to the card, and there's the modern-day scourge of card skimming. Again, reading all track 2 data and opening the card up for CNP fraud or card duplication.
NFC transmits *none* of this data with modern payment infrastructure.
Again, it boils down to a problem of OS implementation, rather than the tech itself.
Which is good. Let the Americans dogfood it.
Given the spectacular security failures in the previous Wallet I don't want this until tested and proven.
They want my media in the cloud, they want my card details in the cloud, they want my whole life in the cloud!
No thank you, I will keep my cards in my wallet, and my media on my server, seriously I have over 1TB of media now, how am I supposed to stick that in the cloud on current speeds?
The cloud is overrated but required for so much now...
This post has been deleted by its author
Hello? I surely hope that insanity hasn't yet set in.
Google, that shiny beacon of privacy defence is going to have insight in every single payment you will be making for the rest of your life? ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR BLOODY MIND?
You already have plenty of reason not to trust the kind of "privacy" Google provides you, and you would allow them (and, by extension, any fool who can whisper the magic words associated with uncontrolled use of anti-terror legislation) sight of your purchases and credit history?
If you say yes to that, let me know what you're smoking.
Because I'd like to avoid that. Big time.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
