Gemalto To Secure Isis Mobile Payments

Isis, still almost a year away from launching its mobile-payments application, is partnering with an industry heavyweight to serve as the security guard for its wallet.

Gemalto N.V. will be the Isis wallet’s trusted service manager, the companies announced Dec. 12. In that role, Gemalto will safeguard the sensitive information transferred between the payment credentials from banks and other payment services stored in a phone’s SIM card to the Isis wallet app on mobile phones.

“We selected Gemalto for their longstanding relationships with financial institutions and mobile operators, which includes experience in securely provisioning services over the air and issuing sensitive financial information to the consumer,” Ryan Hughes, Isis chief marketing officer, said in a press release.

The Amsterdam-based firm has some 45 Near Field Communication-based SIM card mobile-payment initiatives under way worldwide but says Isis is its largest endeavor.

“Isis’ approach of building a single entry point for all the mobile operators through this joint venture will make the deployment [of the system] much more efficient and faster than others in the market,” Sebastian Cano, senior vice president of telecommunications for Gemalto North America, tells PaymentsSource.

Isis is a joint venture involving AT&T Mobility, T-Mobile USA, Verizon Wireless and Discover Financial Services (see story).

Hughes was not immediately available for additional comment.

The Gemalto partnership gives Isis another ally in its SIM-based approach to NFC mobile payments.

Unlike Google Wallet, whose chip is embedded in phones, Isis places the wallet application inside the phone’s SIM card, making it more portable. Last month, 45 partners of the GSM Association mobile operator trade group agreed to support Near Field Communication that uses SIM cards (see story).

Gemalto for obvious reasons supports the SIM card approach but not only because it manufactures the chip. Cano believes the mobile operators have the best distribution channel to get the technology to consumers on a large scale.

“The operators already can get the SIM cards to millions of subscribers,” he says. “Upgrading those cards to contain NFC is something they believe they can easily do.”

Isis’ security announcement comes just a week after multiple media reports suggested Verizon is blocking Google from including its mobile-wallet app on a Nexus phone that runs on the Android operating system (see story). Verizon wants the Google Wallet app integrated into a new, secure and proprietary hardware element in its phones.

Gemalto also is involved with other major NFC initiatives.

The company recently agreed to become the trusted service manager for an NFC system in Singapore that would enable consumers to pay for taxi fares and small purchases with a mobile phone (see story).

Gemalto also supports wireless operator Everything Everywhere Ltd.’s system in the United Kingdom (see story).

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