Apple forms European Apple Pay team for local rollout.

A job ad that made a brief appearance on Apple’s website before being taken down has confirmed that Apple Pay is on its way to Europe. The listing called for a London-based intern who would “drive the roll-out” of Apple’s new mobile payment system across Europe, the Middle East, India, and Africa.

“Apple Pay is a new and exciting area in Apple that is set to expand across Europe, Middle East, India and Africa,” the listing read, before Apple inexplicably pulled it. “Apple Pay will change the way consumers pay with breakthrough contactless payment technology and unique security features built right into their iPhone 6 or Apple Watch to pay in an easy, secure, and private way.”

Thanks to the already increasing presence of NFC terminals in European retail stores, supporting Apple Pay on the other side of the Atlantic isn’t likely to be as difficult as it has been for some retailers in the U.S. However, without the support of banks and credit card providers, Apple Pay cannot succeed.

Apple’s new intern will be required to work with these “payment networks and merchants across Europe” — as well as the Apple Pay teams in the U.S., and a variety of other internal and external partners.

Apple also appears to be forming an Apple Pay Site Reliability Engineering Team in China. The Cupertino company is looking to fill multiple roles “focused on the front line customer experience and the back end integration of Apple systems with our Network and Banking partners.”

Since making its debut this fall, Apple Pay has already added support for the credit cards used to make 90% of purchases in the U.S., the company says. The platform has been incredible well received not only for its ease of use, but also for its security; Apple Pay uses a one-time authorization code to process every transaction made, so your actual credit card details are never shared with retailers.

Apple Pay doesn’t just work in brick-and-mortar retail stores, either, but also inside supported iOS apps. It can be used on the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, the latest iPads, and the upcoming Apple Watch.

Apple wants to replace transit passes with iPhone 6’s NFC.

iPhone 6 owners have only started using Apple Pay to buy items at local stores, but Apple is looking to expand the technology behind its mobile payments system to eventually replace everything from building security cards, subway passes, and bus tickets.

Apple representatives have reportedly been talking to potential partners about using the iPhone 6’s NFC for other uses, reports The Information, with the aim to replace all the tickets and passes you carry in your wallet too.

The Apple representatives have talked to technology providers like HID Global and Cubic, which enable secure access to buildings and transit fare systems, respectively, said people briefed on the discussions. Spokespeople for the companies declined to comment about any discussions with Apple, but executives there discussed how they could integrate their systems with the iPhone.

Apple added NFC to the iPhone 6 after years of speculation that it would need the tech for mobile payments. Access to the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus NFC chips has been closed off from developers, but sources at Apple have informed Cult of Mac that access could be opened up to exclusive partners and eventually all developers in the future.

By giving partners access to the iPhone’s NFC, cards could be uploaded to your Passbook the same way credit cards are added, with key info stored in the secure element. Users could then tap phones at NFC-equiped transit turnstiles to pay for a ride on public systems like San Francisco’s Bay Area Rapid Transit system.

Apple is also adding NFC to the Apple Watch, which will support Apple Pay as well when it launches in early 2015.

Morgan Stanley is totes in love with Apple Pay.

With Apple Pay slated to launch this month, all eyes are on Apple to see if it can shake the curse of NFC payment systems and break through to mass adoption. We won’t know if it succeeds for a while, but Morgan Stanley’s Craig Hettenbach certainly seems upbeat about the possibility. In a release to investors — which AppleInsider pored over — Hettenbach makes some big predictions for Apple’s future in the payment space.

“By reducing fraud, improving data security, and increasing credit/debit volumes for issuers and networks, while protecting the value of the existing payments value chain, we believe Apple Pay has a high chance of success,” Hettenbach boasts, adding that Apple appears to have solved all the major problems that have plagued past NFC payment efforts from the likes of Google and PayPal.

Hettenbach also notes that wide adoption of Apple Pay will likely help boost the appeal and adoption of its competitors’ payment platforms as well, which makes a lot of sense. Right now, NFC on the iPhone 6 and 6+ will remain locked down and out of reach for third-party developers who might want to use it, like Google, but if those bars are removed in the future, it could potentially cause even greater competition between the two tech giants.

McDonald’s to roll out NFC-enabled mobile payments ahead of iPhone 6 launch.

An internal memo sent to McDonald’s franchises this week indicates that the fast food chain is preparing to roll out a mobile payment platform on September 15th. According to the notice, employees are required to be trained on the systems by Monday the 15th and the hardware, which has already started arriving at some locations, must be installed and tested before that date.

It doesn’t seem likely that this is Apple’s upcoming iPhone-exclusive payment system, which the the Cupertino tech firm is already partnering with retailers to roll out, but will instead be a cross-platform NFC option using standard VeriFone hardware that already exists in many locations. That’s not to say the iPhone 6 won’t be able to take advantage of this, as the unannounced device is said to support NFC using chips made by XNP.

Leaked schematic points to NFC’s arrival on iPhone 6.

Not a year goes by without NFC rumors trying to steal the spotlight during iPhone rumor season, and while this year has certainly been no exception, leaked schematic details reveal NFC might actually land on the iPhone 6 this year.

An alleged bare logic board for the iPhone 6 was the first hard evidence that NFC really is coming to the iPhone 6, but now a Chinese repair firm has found what it claims to a wiring schematic specifically for the iPhone 6’s NFC chip.

According to GeekBar, the iPhone 6 will use a PN65V NFC chip similar to what’s been used by Sony, Samsung and others, in many Android handsets. The NFC chip is supposedly being supplied by NXP Semiconductors which also makes the M7 co-processor in the iPhone 5s.

GeekBar has a mixed reputation with iPhone leaks and while we can’t verify the authenticity of the leaked schematic, the PN65V ship does seem fairly straightforward. However, GeekBar botched a RAM leak for the iPhone 6 earlier this morning, claiming it would only have 1GB of

The addition of NFC to the iPhone 6 seems like an odd addition considering Apple could have easily added it since the iPhone 3GS. NFC plays a vital role in a number of mobile payment systems like Google Wallet, and while Apple has been eager to rely on Bluetooth LE, it is possibly that Apple wants to add NFC for its own mobile payments system that is rumored to debut with the iPhone 6.

Isis NFC payment system to roll out later this year, provide iPhone support.

When three of the big four mobile carriers — AT&T Mobility, T-Mobile US, and Verizon Wireless — agree on something, you know that it’s going to get a big push. The three companies formed Isis in early 2011 to orchestrate the future of near field communication (NFC) payments, and today the joint venture announced that the Isis Mobile Wallet system will be rolled out nationwide later this year.

Isis Mobile Wallet users need an NFC-enabled smartphone and a SIM-based secure element to be considered “Isis Ready.” Many Samsung Android devices are equipped for NFC, both for local file sharing and payments. At this point, NFC technology isn’t built into iPhones, nor has there been any word from Apple on whether the technology will be in future devices. Nevertheless, the joint venture notes that support for iPhone, Windows Phone and BlackBerry 10 will be introduced this year.

Isis trials were held in Austin, Texas and Salt Lake City, Utah, and the Isis group found that the users were quite happy with paying from their smartphones. The trial showed that active users used their devices for payment more than 10 times per month, acceptance of contactless payment quadrupled to almost 4,000 locations in the two cities, and that 80 percent of the transactions took place at places like fast-food restaurants, coffee shops, gas stations, and convenience and grocery stores.

If Apple doesn’t embrace NFC with the next generation of iPhones, it’s likely that an NFC-enabled case will be required in order to use Isis.

Source: TUAW.

iPhone 6 concept surfaces based on wraparound display patent.

Following Apple’s wraparound display patent released earlier this month, T3 has created a 3D rendering of the iPhone 6 based on the patent, with some rather interesting results.

When I first viewed the video, I was initially skeptical, the video depicts Apple’s Home Screen taking up both sides of your iPhone’s display, which doesn’t look so great. Granted, this rendering isn’t as polished at as an Apple product, but the Home Screen rendering just seems wrong, it’s a hard criticism to put your finger on, but for me, it’s the weakest part of the rendering.

However, the rest of the design is actually very good. It depicts a 1615×1800 wraparound display, with AMOLED suggested at the favoured technology because that’s the technology the patent was based on. It also features a 2MP front-facing camera, although “front-facing” is something of a misnomer because both sides of this device are arguably “the front”.

The base of the device is essentially identical to the iPhone 5, with a Lightning connector and 2 speakers, however, there’s also NFC for contactless payments. The design really shines when viewing video, which looks tremendous. And there’s also an interesting concept where users can view a game on one face of the device, whilst operating controls displayed on the other side, sounds a little tricky, but when you think about it, it’s a very clever idea. Take a look at the video below, and be sure to let us know what you think in the comments!

Source: TodaysiPhone.

US Bank releases NFC iPhone case for ‘Go Mobile’ payment service trial.

US Bank has announced it is kicking off a limited trial of its Go Mobile payment service via an NFC-enabled iPhone case. The Go Mobile wireless payment service is initially being rolled out in Salt Lake City, Utah, and Portland, Ore. US Bank customers in either city can visit a bank branch for information on how to obtain a case.

It’s not immediately apparent if the cases will be free to customers or if there’s a charge. On their website US Bank says the requirements are “an iPhone 4 or 4S and [the ability] to qualify for a US Bank FlexPerks Travel Rewards Visa Signature card to use the US Bank Go Mobile Payment Service.”

The NFC-enabled case can be used at retailers in either city that use Visa’s payWave terminals.

Apple has chosen to hold its payment cards close to the vest while rival phones using Google’s Android OS experiment with the Google Wallet NFC payment system. Although there were hints that iOS 6 would include some payment/digital wallet capabilities that might be supported by future mobile hardware, the current Passbook feature delivers quite a bit of payment and check-in power — but saves a lot of engineering by simply displaying 1D barcodes that work with conventional laser scanners at retail, and 2D codes that work with airport/Amtrak check-in and other scanners.

Source: TUAW.

Apple Inked A Deal That Bring Fingerprint NFC Tech To The iPhone.

It looks like Apple is really interested in doing something involving biosecurity in the future. A few months ago Apple acquired fingerprint sensor maker AuthenTec, and now they just signed a deal with an Australian company that specializes in fingerprint and biometric security that is processed via NFC.

According to The Australian, Apple has just signed a deal with Microlatch which will allow Apple to develop fingerprint technology for use in NFC applications. Microlatch owns patents that comply with banking standards that allow users to use their fingerprints or other biometric data and process them on their smartphone without a need for it to be transmitted or stored externally  like on a banks computer.

The financials of the deal has not been disclosed. After Apple left NFC out of the iPhone 5 we expect Apple to either add it in the next iPhone, or come up with a different method of mobile payment and communication. Some analysts anticipated that Apple would implement AuthenTec’s technology in the iPhone 5, but it’s more likely that we won’t see it until the iPhone 5S or iPhone 6.

Source:  Cult of Mac.