A pilot project has been jointly launched by Visa International and Nokia in Malaysia this week. The Mobile Visa Wave Payment Pilot is designed to allow consumers to shop and pay for goods using a specially enabled mobile phone.
200 Visa cardholders are taking part in the trial in which they will be given a Nokia 3230 phone with RFID chip to scan in any of the 2500 participating retail outlets. The technology is based on the Visa Wave smart card system already being used by 4 million consumers worldwide.
The Nokia 3230 phones use cryptography and the latest technology to prevent counterfeiting and fraudulent use.
Although take up for the Visa Wave system has been good the 4 million users still represents a small proportion of the 1.4 billion Visa cardholders worldwide. Visa are keen to tap into the huge mobile phone market which is predicted to reach 3 billion by 2008. It is believe that a mass market version of the software could be available by 2007.
More details: www.nokia.com
