You are right, ApplePay is more secure. However, it will never have widespread acceptance by the consumer.
Hoooookay, let's break this down.
"Will never have widespread acceptance by the consumer".
The same has been said of literally dozens of technologies going back a hundred years, including the telephone, credit cards, CDs, and pretty much all of Apple's products.
Just 'cause it's easy:
http://fortune.com/2009/12/01/the-great-iphone-death-watch/
First, you will need an iPhone 6 or later, or the Apple watch, to use, which at this time is only about 10 million. Sure, it will increase over the next few years,
This is so obvious that it hardly bears mentioning, but:
1. 10 million was first weekend sales. Pre-orders were 4 million, and how many have been sold since then? Apparently another 11 million:
http://blog.gsmarena.com/apple-iphone-6-sales-detailed-infographic-reach-21-million/
21 million customers aren't insignificant, and the numbers are growing daily. Heck, it's hard to FIND an iPhone 6 lately, and forget the 6 Plus.
2. More than 500 banks and several more retailers have signed on in the past month.
but convincing Apple users to actually use it will be even more difficult.
Most people don't trust their device to be secure, or the fear of losing their phone with all that information on it.
I presume you've conducted a poll that leads you to this statement?
As an infosec professional, I trust my iPhone with my information much more than I would trust an Android device. That's not hyperbole, that's real threat analysis.
But let's examine this statement: You postulate that iPhone owners will carry their phones around with whatever level of personal information is in it, but will somehow be scared to store a number in a secure element that isn't even their actual credit card number?
Sure, it is secure for now, but some hacker will find a way. They always do.
There's a kernel of truth in there, I suppose, but hackers don't *always* find a way. Not everything has been proven vulnerable, but we *are* talking about payments here; a very legitimate target. So let's examine the security for a moment.
First, let's examine how a credit card payment is handled today.
You swipe your card in a terminal or give it to a clerk, who swipes the mag stripe. The stripe contains the PAN, or Personal Account Number - your credit card number - which is transmitted to one of dozens of credit card processing companies affiliated with Mastercard, Visa, Discover, etc. The processor then transmits the data to your bank, who authorizes the transaction and charges your account.
There are several vulnerabilities here. First, if you hand your card to someone, you risk the use of a skimmer that they are carrying, whereby they swipe your card twice, once in a device that records the PAN and other data off the card. Of course, we've all heard of skimmers being installed in gas pumps, ATMs, and the like as well.
Next, your card info goes to the merchant's own network/processing system in many cases, especially with the larger retailers. This is where most of the breaches have occurred due to various security inadequacies.
Your card number then goes to the processor, who has a network and systems as well, with the potential for hackers to penetrate.
Finally, it goes to the bank, which could possibly be penetrated as well (see JP Morgan Chase).
That's a lot of vulnerable points - every merchant, every processor, and every bank. Your card number could be compromised at any one of them. Or along any of the network connections between them.
Now let's look at Apple Pay.
You tap your phone to the terminal, and use your fingerprint to authorize the transaction. The iPhone sends the Device Account Number - a random number used as a stand-in for the credit card number - along with a one-time cryptogram to make the session unique. It's slightly more complicated than that, but the gist is that even if these are intercepted anywhere along the path from the phone to the bank - be it the NFC connection (which is vulnerable to interception over-the-air at distance), the merchant network/servers, the payment processors, or any of the network paths up to and including the one to the bank, it doesn't matter: The numbers presented are valid one time only.
So, there's only two places to attempt to find valuable data: The bank, and the phone.
The bank might be vulnerable to a hack attempt (again, see JP Morgan). However, that same hack would make ANY payment type vulnerable - chip & pin, CurrentC, ISIS/Softwallet, or conventional cards.
The phone is not vulnerable for a few reasons:
1. The card number is NOT stored in the phone.
2. The Device Account Number is stored (encrypted) in the Secure Element, a special chip that is isolated from iOS and would need to be damaged in order to forcibly retrieve its (encrypted) contents.
3. The phone, if stolen, can be wiped remotely.
So, really, we are left with effectively one way for the hackers to get valuable data - attack the bank - as opposed to attacking the device, NFC transmission, merchant, processor, network connections between all of the above, AND the bank as with conventional cards AND Chip/Pin.
Now for me, I think ApplePay is vastly better than using any type of credit card, and I will use it. However, the general population will have fear about scanning their credit card info on their phone.
However, they enter it into their iPhone to initially authorize iTunes payments - and that card that is on file WON'T have to be entered to be used with Apple Pay. They also enter it into potentially insecure web sites and swipe it in terminals at stores that could be involved in the next big breach. Once they are told WHY this makes sense from a security perspective, the more intelligent will realize that this is a GOOD thing.
And when everyone gets their current cards replaced with chip and pin in 2015, MasterCard and Visa will air tons of commercials telling everyone how safe their accounts now are.
And plenty of security pros will counter with the fact that chip and pin only secures against the theft of a physical card, not the numbers on it.
No one who did or would have used chip and pin would have been safe at Target, Home Depot, KMart, Michael's, TJ Maxx, or any of the other merchant breaches. Once that is made clear, that argument, if made at all, would be seen for what it is.
The fact of the matter is that they are, to a degree, complimentary technologies from a security perspective. If you have Apple Pay, but your wallet is lost or stolen, your normal credit card is still at risk. With chip and pin, it's less at risk. It's not SAFE, since vulnerabilities within the chip's transaction authorization protocol render it vulnerable to spoofing exist, but it's safer in that your average person finding the card won't be able to use it.
People will believe them and shy away from ever using their smartphones, whether iPhone or Android, to make purchases.
I think that when the next breach happens and the merchant announces that customers who paid with a credit card may have had it compromised, but people who paid with Apple Pay have nothing to worry about that many more people will change their minds.
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If I were Apple, I would encourage ALL phones to partake in the festivities. Remember Apple is getting a slice of that profit pie each time its used. So initially, it may be
pay for idevices but I suspect before long it will be
pay for all devices with the technology.
I disagree. Apple wants to sell more of THEIR phones, and they can't control another manufacturer's phone. Apple Pay is both a revenue stream AND a market differentiator. "Your payments are not secure unless you buy OUR device!" is the message they will send. And, largely, they will be right, until and unless someone else does something similar. However, in the Android camp, someone like Samsung would have to work closely with Google to develop it and THEN they would have to sell it to the banks, merchants, and processors. From what I read, Samsung and Google - perhaps the only two parties that could dance this particular dance - don't get along so famously. Apple is a lot safer and surer bet as a technology partner.