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UK parents whose children are eligible for free school meals will be able to receive digital vouchers they can use on their smartphone or tablet to buy food at participating retail outlets while schools remain closed during the country’s second lockdown, the UK government has announced. The national voucher scheme will enable UK schools that […]

Owners of Samsung’s new Galaxy S21 smartphones in the USA will not be able to make payments using Samsung Pay’s magnetic secure transmission (MST) technology. Although company publicity for Galaxy S21 lists both MST and NFC as payment options available on the new phones, Samsung says that “payment solutions and available features may vary depending

Apple iPhone users who purchase a BMW iX electric car will be able to lock, unlock and start the vehicle without taking their smartphone out of their bag or pocket using ultra-wideband (UWB) functionality built into an upgraded version of the vehicle manufacturer’s Digital Key. BMW’s Digital Key Plus uses the UWB technology on the

Owners of Fiat Chrysler vehicles equipped with the manufacturer’s Uconnect Market connected services platform will soon be able to order and pay for their favourite food and beverages from restaurants in 4,000 US cities via an app embedded in their in-vehicle touchscreen. In addition to reordering past favourites for pick-up or delivery, users passing a

UK residents are to take part in a pilot of a digital immunity and vaccination passport that enables them to use their mobile phone to disclose their Covid-19 test results or vaccination status without revealing their identity. Participants in the trial will be issued with a free app, allowing them to prove that they have

The Agricultural Bank of China has launched pilot ATMs that enable customers in Shenzhen to deposit and withdraw money in the form of digital yuan, the country’s central bank digital currency (CBDC). The launch comes as part of the third large-scale trial of the digital currency in the city by the People’s Bank of China

Customers of Emirates NBD in the Middle East, North Africa and Turkey are the first in the region to be able to verify their identity documents when they open a new account using an NFC-powered solution on the bank’s mobile banking app. “The bank’s TruID solution uses NFC technology to read information from embedded chips

Mastercard is piloting a cloud-based version of its Tap on Phone payments acceptance solution, enabling merchants of all sizes to accept cloud-hosted contactless payments directly on their Android NFC smartphone or tablet. “Cloud POS moves key parts of the acceptance software — the components that enable the processing of contactless transactions and certain security functions

The number of people using QR code payment services globally will rise from 1.5 billion in 2020 to more than 2.2 billion in 2025, representing close to one in three (29%) of all the world’s mobile phone users, Juniper Research predicts. The researchers forecast that “much of this growth will be within emerging markets, where