ING ditches hardware to counter mobile point of sale fintechs in Turkey

ING is piloting an Android-based app that supports smartphone card payments without a connected dongle or investment in a payment terminal.

The bank is starting with 200 small businesses in Istanbul, Turkey, in partnership with Mastercard. ING's “Tap on Phone” app will work with any Android-based smartphone or tablet, using the device’s NFC capabilities to accept card payments. ING plans to expand the pilot to other countries that have similar needs.

ING will encrypt data and use cloud storage to manage security and privacy, and will also allow small businesses to track inventory and check daily transactions in real time.

Jasper Juinen/Bloomberg

The bank is targeting small businesses that don’t have dedicated payment terminals and usually accept low card transaction volume, similar to Square's demographic. Square, which began its business with low transaction volume small businesses, is increasingly targeting higher transaction volume companies with offerings such as Square for Restaurants.

ING hopes to benefit from 2018 changes to the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council’s requirements of PIN entry on mobile devices. Before the change, a software app could only accept a PIN for a card transaction via a PIN-entry device. The new standard allows PINs to be secured by isolating it from other data on the phone and using a new set of security controls that extend beyond the physical hardware.

MagicCube recently partnered with NTT Data to certify and deploy software that allows the secure input of sensitive data such as PINs and card numbers on a smartphone or tablet without having to use a dedicated PIN-entry device in Japan.