9 Weirdest Moments in Mobile Payments

Published September 28, 2012 11:46 AM

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Updated October 20, 2016 10:51 AM

1 Min Read

Personage 3D with tactile telephone in the Universe

Benjamin Albiach GalA!n/Getty Images/iStockphoto

(Image: ThinkStock)

business conference

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Attack Ad

VeriFone's response to Square's introduction of a competing mobile card reader was to produce an infomercial-style video wherein its CEO explains how the rival Square reader can be adapted by fraudsters to steal card data and VeriFone went so far as to distribute a "demo" skimming app to prove its point. (Image: ThinkStock)

Fashion Statement

Who knew "pink camouflage" could help mobile-payment adoption? Bling Nation, which distributed payment-capable stickers for people to attach to their phones, found consumers were more eager to use its system when it offered a selection of colors and patterns than when it made stickers with only bank logos printed on them. (Pictured: Earl Bradley, CEO of First Advantage Bank of Clarksville, Tenn.)

Google Inc. homepages are displayed on Samsung Electronics Co. Galaxy S II smartphones, running on Google's Android software, in Seoul, South Korea, on Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2011. Google Inc.'s Seoul office was raided by South Korea's antitrust regulator as part of a probe into whether the owner of the world's largest search engine unfairly blocked competitors in the mobile-search market, a person familiar with the investigation said. Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg

SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg

Sea of NFC

Google's mobile wallet relies on Near Field Communication chips to allow payments at the point of sale so its Motorola Mobility unit's recent introduction of three NFC-equipped phones should have been a major boost for Google's payment system. It wasn't. Google didn't place its Google Wallet app on any of those phones. (Image: Bloomberg News

An attendee uses the new Google Inc. Nexus 7 tablet during the Google I/O conference in San Francisco, California, U.S., on Thursday, June 28, 2012. Google Inc., owner of the world's most popular search engine, unveiled a cloud-computing service for building and running applications to help woo customers and challenge Amazon.com Inc.'s Web Services. Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg

David Paul Morris/Bloomberg

Not So Mobile

If you can't get payment-capable phones in consumers' hands, what about a tablet? Shortly after shipping its budget-priced Nexus 7 tablet, Google added the Google Wallet app. It's not exactly pocket-sized, but it works. (Image: Bloomberg News)

Map Of Sweden

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Travel Troubles

In August, the mobile payments company iZettle learned it could not handle Visa payments in Finland, Denmark and Norway, but that Visa Europe would still allow it to handle Visa payments in Sweden. At the time, iZettle and Visa Europe did not explain why this is, though some suspect it has to do with rules around PIN acceptance. (Image: ThinkStock)

The Google Inc. Mobile Wallet application for cardless payment is displayed on a smartphone screen at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, on Wednesday, Feb. 29, 2012. The Mobile World Congress, operated by the GSMA, expects 60,000 visitors and 1400 companies to attend the four-day technology industry event which runs Feb. 27 through March 1. Photographer: Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg

Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg

PIN Punctured

Speaking of PIN codes, Google Wallet had a very odd security issue. A researcher discovered that fraudsters could access the Google Wallet virtual prepaid account's stored funds by simply deleting the account's PIN instead of cracking it. Google fixed the issue right away, but it eventually phased out the prepaid card entirely. (Image: Bloomberg News)

Endless Summer

Isis, the mobile-payment venture founded by the major U.S. mobile carriers, has promised through September that it would begin testing during the summer. Even as summer's Sept. 21 end neared, and its partners conceded that the test had been delayed, Isis maintained that it was still on track.

A customer, left, holds his new Apple Inc. iPhone 5, after paying for the unit in euro notes inside the Apple store at the Gran Plaza 2 shopping mall in Majadahonda, near Madrid, Spain, on Friday, Sept. 28, 2012. Apple said it is working to catch up with demand, "We are working hard to get an iPhone 5 into the hands of every customer who wants one as quickly as possible," Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook said in a statement. Photographer: Angel Navarrete/Bloomberg

Angel Navarrete/Bloomberg

Ambiguous Apple

Apple's approach to mobile payments leaves some confusion over whether it has a mobile wallet. Its Passbook app can load any barcode-based card or ticket, but its latest iPhone doesn't have an NFC chip for wireless payments. Apple could choose to build on Passbook or it could use its numerous NFC patents to design its next iPhone. (Image: Bloomberg News)

Consumers Don't Care

Perhaps the most bizarre thing about the mobile-pay movement is the lack of demand by consumers. Experts agree mobile wallets are inevitable, but consumers don't all share banks' enthusiasm for the new technology. (Image: ThinkStock)