Fingerprint payments face hurdles ahead of commercialisation   

“指纹支付”进入商用阶段 推广面临多重考验

支付宝与华为近日联合宣布推出“指纹支付”服务。分析认为，在移动支付交易增幅放缓的情况下，“指纹支付”入局或将凭借其安全特性为行业带来活力。然而，指纹支付短时要撬动更大市场将面临技术成本偏高、应用场景有限及市场热情待提升等挑战。[查看全文]

(ECNS) -- With fingerprint payments making headlines in China this week, experts say putting this technology into commercial use may not be as easy as first thought.

On September 1, Alipay, China's biggest online payment platform, teamed up with telecommunications giant Huawei to promote initial fingerprint payments via the latter's Mate 7 smartphone.

However, to use such biometric technology, users have to bear a big price.

Li Xiaolong, a deputy director at Huawei, said to add chip-level security and fingerprint readers to the phone could push up the Mate 7's production cost ten-fold.

At the IFA tech show held in Berlin this week, Huawei released the Mate 7 with a price tag of 499 euros ($645).

Limited offline occasions to use the technology is another hurdle to overcome. Right now, fingerprint technology is mostly used for online payments, and extending the use to offline transactions would be a huge boost to its popularization, said Alipay's senior director Kong Qi.

For example, after a customer pays for a hotel reservation online with the use of fingerprints, he or she could continue using these prints to check in and obtain a room key.

Also, market enthusiasm needs to be lifted, as concerns about security may hold back customers from using the technology.