Technology giants Google and Samsung have become the first mobile wallet providers to sign up to MasterCard’s Digital Enablement Express programme, which aims to expedite the process of tokenizing MasterCard accounts.
Express service
The Express initiative, which is an extension of the MasterCard Digital Enablement Service (MDES), permits the likes of Google and Samsung to request payment tokens, in turn allowing them to deliver new and innovative payment services to consumers around the world.
The programme is the result of years of collaboration between MasterCard, technology partners and financial institutions, as they all look to bring tokenized payments to market. The culmination of this hard work has allowed MasterCard to tokenize smartphone devices, Internet of Things (IoT) environments and Card on File systems.
MasterCard has outlined the key benefits of signing up to the programme:
- Global Scale, Speed and Consumer Reach: One set of standard terms for participants expedites the process of digitizing and tokenizing MasterCard accounts, and creates efficiencies in delivering secure digital payments globally.
- No added fees: MasterCard does not facilitate pass through fees between financial institutions and token requestors under the Express program.
- Increased Security: Express furthers MasterCard’s longstanding commitment to privacy by limiting the use and sharing of sensitive cardholder data and transaction information, and enabling the use of tokenized credentials to protect payment integrity, decrease fraud rates and protect merchant rights.
The programme also gives digital payment providers the opportunity to connect with all participating banks.
Digital enablement
A number of financial institutions have already signed up to the Express programme, including Capital One, Fifth Third Bank and KeyBank, who become the first issuers to announce their support.
‘‘MasterCard is working relentlessly to increase payment security and enable innovative new digital services for consumers, to the benefit of all participants in our network,’’ said Ed McLaughlin, chief emerging payments officer at MasterCard.
‘‘Express now allows key technology partners to make their offerings available to all MasterCard issuers in a simple, safe and consistent manner, extending our network model into digital enablement.’’
Google has signed up to the service as a way to faster connect consumers to Android Pay, with Ariel Bardin, Google’s VP of payments, claiming that Express will ‘‘give us a highly scalable way to enable issuing banks to participate in Android Pay, while at the same time, launch a service that has broad consumer access.’’
Samsung has followed Google’s lead, with the Korea-based firm signing up to the service in order to expand the reach of its mobile wallet, Samsung Pay. It will be extremely interesting to see if Apple Pay agrees to join MasterCard’s programme, heating up the race for mobile payment supremacy.
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