MasterCard to join FIDO Alliance

MasterCard will join the FIDO Alliance, but the major financial services company doesn’t want you to know about it … yet.

Reported this afternoon in USA Today, citing anonymous inside sources, MasterCard is set to join the growing industry alliance and will be the first major payment group to join. According to one of the anonymous sources in the USA Today report, the move may be announced at the Money 2020 payments industry conference in Las Vegas next week.

Though the company will remain mum until an official announcement is made, the move is ultimately unsurprising, as MasterCard currently plays a role in many projects in Africa incorporating biometric data.

Reported previously, MasterCard and the National Identity Management Commission announced the production of 13 million MasterCard-branded National Identity Smart Cards, which include electronic payment capabilities. These particular identity cards incorporate Nigerian national identification numbers – the enrollment for which requires 10 fingerprints, a facial image and digital signature for authentication.

Also, last year, the South African Social Security Agency teamed up with MasterCard to launch biometric payment cards.

The FIDO Alliance, which is looking to develop an open industry standard for dealing with identification using data such as biometrics, has been very busy as of late, and new members join often.

The FIDO Alliance is featured in a recent feature in Biometric Update’s new digital magazine on developing standards in the biometric space. Read the full feature in your browser here. 

Article Topics

biometric payments  |  FIDO Alliance  |  Mastercard  |  standards