Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With
Speaker 1: tech Stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello again, everyone,
Speaker 1: Welcome to tech stuff. My name is Chris Poulette and
Speaker 1: I'm an editor at how stuff works dot com. Sitting
Speaker 1: across from me, as always senior writer Jonathan Strickland. It
Speaker 1: ain't fair how we scrounged for three or four bucks
Speaker 1: while she gets warbucks. The little brat as always excellent.
Speaker 1: Thank you. So we're gonna talk about Google Wallet today, indeed,
Speaker 1: and Google Wallet was a project that was announced back
Speaker 1: in I think May of eleven. It is now late
Speaker 1: June twenty eleven when we're recording this podcast, but we
Speaker 1: wanted to kind of talk about it and kind of
Speaker 1: go over what the implications of the the product is.
Speaker 1: Our gosh, I'm so tired. I've just got back from
Speaker 1: vacation and my my ability to speak in coherent sentences
Speaker 1: with proper grammar is sorely depleted. Yes, yes, so Google
Speaker 1: wallet fire bad. Um. Anyway, so we wanted to talk
Speaker 1: about what Google walle it is, how it works in
Speaker 1: a kind of bird's eye view level and what it
Speaker 1: might mean to the future of making purchases. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: funny because this is not really a new topic at all,
Speaker 1: but it's new to many people here in the United
Speaker 1: States because I mean, this is the kind of thing
Speaker 1: that's been going on for many years over in Asia. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Japan in particular, Japan in particular. Um, basically the idea
Speaker 1: of being that you could uh store payment information in
Speaker 1: your cell phone or smartphone and uh use that information
Speaker 1: to make a payment when you go to a store. Yes,
Speaker 1: so instead of scanning a you know, swiping your credit
Speaker 1: card and signing a little digital thing, or or having
Speaker 1: to put in your pin number if you're using a
Speaker 1: debit card, or even using a credit card that has
Speaker 1: an r F I D chip in it where you
Speaker 1: know you'll you'll see those consoles at certain vendors where
Speaker 1: you can tap the card and that registers as a payment. Uh,
Speaker 1: instead of using a card at all, it would be
Speaker 1: stored on your phone. And you might ask, well, why
Speaker 1: would you even bother to do that, Like, why why
Speaker 1: have it on your phone? As opposed to if you
Speaker 1: if it's replacing tapping a card, how does that make
Speaker 1: it easier? If you put it on a phone, and
Speaker 1: that's a that's a legitimate question. I mean, one answer
Speaker 1: you could arguably give is that, well, you cut down
Speaker 1: on the things you need to carry. But when you're
Speaker 1: talking about a credit card, it's not like that's a huge,
Speaker 1: bulky thing that's really weighing it down. In fact, it's
Speaker 1: much smaller form factor than a cell phone or smartphone.
Speaker 1: So really the value in the proposition is that Google
Speaker 1: has has grouped this ability to pay through a a
Speaker 1: smartphone own with other services that kind of make it
Speaker 1: more of an attractive service. It's not it's not just
Speaker 1: that you can pay with a smartphone. There are other
Speaker 1: features that are involved that are pretty cool. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: in addition to that, Google says that it doesn't intend
Speaker 1: to replace a credit card. It intends to replace all
Speaker 1: of your credit cards and your loyalty cards. Does the
Speaker 1: cards that you carry around with you to UM. You know,
Speaker 1: if you you're at your grocery store and you get,
Speaker 1: you know, fifty cents off a can of tomatoes if
Speaker 1: you have the card, UM, basically you're selling them your
Speaker 1: information so they can market to you. But you also
Speaker 1: exchange they'll give you a discount, and you also get yeah,
Speaker 1: so not just loyalty cards, but also coupons, like electronic coupons.
Speaker 1: So so there might be a loyalty program. For example,
Speaker 1: here's an easy one. My wife really likes coffee, right,
Speaker 1: so she has loyalty cards with practically every coffee shop
Speaker 1: that is in a ten mile radius of our home. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Her loyalty to coffee as legendary, Yes, to the point
Speaker 1: where you know, she has to sort through her loyalty
Speaker 1: cards when she goes into a coffee shop to determine
Speaker 1: which one of her cards applies at that shop. And
Speaker 1: so you know, it's one of those things where you know,
Speaker 1: you buy nine coffees and the tenth one is free,
Speaker 1: same sort of thing, except it stored electronically on your phone,
Speaker 1: and so it the the application of Google Wallet keeps
Speaker 1: track of how many times you've been to this particular
Speaker 1: place and bought a particular thing, and then automatically registers
Speaker 1: when you hit ten, and so when you go to
Speaker 1: pay it registered, it files that information for you. It's
Speaker 1: the same as if your card had been stamped a
Speaker 1: tenth time, and then you don't have to uh and
Speaker 1: want you don't get the price of the coffee deducted
Speaker 1: from your account or charged to your card. Um. And
Speaker 1: before we get too far into this, just before we
Speaker 1: launch into it, I wanted to mention UH that we
Speaker 1: do have an article about paying UH with a cell phone.
Speaker 1: In fact, it's called can you use a cell Phone
Speaker 1: as a credit Card? And Julia Layton wrote that article
Speaker 1: and it's a UM. If you go and read the article,
Speaker 1: you'll actually notice that there's some mention of of this
Speaker 1: debuting in the United States back in two thousand seven,
Speaker 1: and not Google Wallet, but the ability to pay using
Speaker 1: using a phone as a credit card. Now, keep in mind,
Speaker 1: even two thousand seven is late to the game compared
Speaker 1: to Japan. That's that's true. That's true. UM. I just
Speaker 1: wanted to go before we go any further to UM.
Speaker 1: Google is also saying that in addition to loyalty cards
Speaker 1: and credit cards, Google says that it that Google Wallet
Speaker 1: will eventually allow you to use gift cards, receipts, boarding passes,
Speaker 1: UM and and possibly your keys UM available through Google Wallet.
Speaker 1: So UM it would in fact, in theory be able
Speaker 1: to reduce the amount of stuff you would need to
Speaker 1: carry in your wallet. Now, I noticed there's no driver's
Speaker 1: license mentioned in their passport. That would be interesting to see.
Speaker 1: Although passports in the United States do have a radio
Speaker 1: frequency identification chip, Yes they do. So I have a
Speaker 1: little little wallet that blocks that. Yes, mine. We'll talk
Speaker 1: about that later too, because that's gonna come up. But
Speaker 1: we should probably talk about the you know, how it
Speaker 1: works and the benefits of using it. Sure now, when
Speaker 1: they were when Google was launching this, they were talking
Speaker 1: about two specific other partners with this. Yes, there are
Speaker 1: also thousands of vendors that are going to support this,
Speaker 1: but the two partners specifically that I wanted to talk
Speaker 1: about where Sprint because the phone that they're debuting the
Speaker 1: Google Wallet service on is the Nexus S four G,
Speaker 1: which is only on Sprint, Yes, all right. And then
Speaker 1: City MasterCard, which is that you know, that's where that's
Speaker 1: got the financial backing. That's so if you want to
Speaker 1: have Google Wallet, you have really two choices as far
Speaker 1: as what kind of payment option you go with. You
Speaker 1: can either apply to get a City MasterCard account, or
Speaker 1: if you already have one, you can enter that information
Speaker 1: into Google Wallet and that will become your Google Wallet account.
Speaker 1: Or you can get a Google Prepaid card and Google
Speaker 1: Prepaid Card is you know, it's essentially what sounds like,
Speaker 1: you can you can put money into your Google Prepaid
Speaker 1: card and use that for payments, kind of like you know,
Speaker 1: like pay Pal or any other sort of gift card
Speaker 1: kind of approach. Um, And what's kind of interesting is
Speaker 1: that if you do the Google prepay approach, they will
Speaker 1: actually credit you ten dollars in your account, so you'll
Speaker 1: get ten bucks for free. Yeah, I thought that was
Speaker 1: pretty funny. Actually, and at least until um the end
Speaker 1: of twenty eleven, you will not have to pay any
Speaker 1: fees to add money to your Google Prepaid card. So,
Speaker 1: in other words, it's not like you get a service
Speaker 1: feed up added on top of you know, you want
Speaker 1: to add say a hundred dollars to your Google Prepaid card,
Speaker 1: You're not going to get a service fee of five
Speaker 1: bucks on top of that, at least until the end
Speaker 1: of twenty eleven. Now, uh, what does that mean that
Speaker 1: in they'll start adding in a service fee. Maybe we
Speaker 1: don't know. But the wording is specifically about till the
Speaker 1: end of or at least until the end of twenty eleven,
Speaker 1: is how they put it. So, um, yeah, you've got
Speaker 1: so you've got the that's the backing as far as
Speaker 1: payment goes, so it's either City MasterCard or the prepaid card,
Speaker 1: which you can use any credit card to purchase money
Speaker 1: to go toward the prepaid card. You don't have to
Speaker 1: have a City master Card for that one. Uh. Well,
Speaker 1: what about the actual payment process, like, how does this
Speaker 1: transfer happen? Well, it happens through UM something called an
Speaker 1: NFC chip. Yes, that's near field communication. UM. This is
Speaker 1: a little different from the r F I D chip
Speaker 1: that you find in your UH and some of your
Speaker 1: credit cards, which is if you if you have one,
Speaker 1: you'll know it. It's that that little uh usually gold
Speaker 1: color or silver colored UM piece of metal embedded in
Speaker 1: the chip. Basically that has your your information UH in
Speaker 1: it so that when you UH take it near one
Speaker 1: of those paid UH pads and you touch it to
Speaker 1: that the pad can read that of course. UM. You know,
Speaker 1: basically it's as far as you know, it's not electronic
Speaker 1: or anything like that. It doesn't have you know, need
Speaker 1: a battery or anything to operate. UM. So it's it,
Speaker 1: but it's essentially always on. There's nothing keeping it from
Speaker 1: being read at any time, which is one of the
Speaker 1: criticisms people have of R f i D chips, and
Speaker 1: as Jonathan was saying, he's got apparently he carries a
Speaker 1: Faraday cage in his wallet. It's a it's it's a
Speaker 1: special case that has r f i D blocking material,
Speaker 1: or not r f i D blocking material, but blocks
Speaker 1: radio frequencies. Right, So if somebody had something that could
Speaker 1: if he weren't carrying that, and somebody had something that
Speaker 1: could pick up an r f i D chip near enough,
Speaker 1: and they just you know, bumped into him in public,
Speaker 1: say like a pickpocket might, except without having to pick
Speaker 1: his pocket, they could read the number off of the card. Um.
Speaker 1: I also find that having r f i D chips,
Speaker 1: multiple r f i D chips in my wallet will
Speaker 1: interfere with things like the UH rapid transit system in Atlanta.
Speaker 1: If you have another r f i D chip, it
Speaker 1: will you know, they'll the two signals will cancel each
Speaker 1: other out and say I can't read that the wallet. Um,
Speaker 1: that's annoying. It's so irritating having to go all the
Speaker 1: way to taking a card out of your wallet to
Speaker 1: tap against the little circle so that you can go
Speaker 1: in and ride public transportation. Such an inconvenience, But in goodness,
Speaker 1: we got rid of that token system. But in contrast, UM,
Speaker 1: the near field communication system can be turned on and off,
Speaker 1: and there is a transceiver built into UH the NFC
Speaker 1: enabled phones in this case the nexus S that will
Speaker 1: allow you to transmit that information, so it can be
Speaker 1: you can turn it off essentially. UM, now you can
Speaker 1: have and you can have a passive NFC system where
Speaker 1: where one element is just like with r F I D,
Speaker 1: where one element is is active and then the other
Speaker 1: one is passive. But in the case of smartphones we're
Speaker 1: talking about and both both parts are active. And then
Speaker 1: you say, all right, well enough about this, how does
Speaker 1: it actually work? All right? Well, uses inductive coupling. Really, yeah,
Speaker 1: so we're talking inducing electricity. And if you guys have
Speaker 1: been listening to tech stuff for a while, you know
Speaker 1: we've talked about this in multiple episodes and including some
Speaker 1: of our Basic Electronics episodes and others. So induction, we're
Speaker 1: talking about that wonderful relationship between electric electricity and magnetic fields.
Speaker 1: So electric fields and the magnetic fields, and so what's
Speaker 1: happening with U NFC is that it's you have at
Speaker 1: least one element that's producing magnetic field and then you
Speaker 1: have another element that has a coil of wire in it.
Speaker 1: And when you pass that that chip that has the
Speaker 1: coil of wire in it next or through that magnetic field,
Speaker 1: it alters the magnetic field, all right, and it alters
Speaker 1: it in such a way depending upon the coil of
Speaker 1: wire that's in that chip and other elements. It manipulates
Speaker 1: that magnetic field in such a way that something that
Speaker 1: electricity flows through that active element and then whatever is
Speaker 1: supposed to happen theoretically happens. So yeah, exactly. So example,
Speaker 1: for example, if it's a locked door and it has
Speaker 1: an electric lock that is producing this, it's using near
Speaker 1: field communication. UM. You have the little pad on the
Speaker 1: door that is actively generating this magnetic field. You pass
Speaker 1: your key fob through that magnetic field. It registers that
Speaker 1: as the correct uh kind of alteration of that mannetic
Speaker 1: field that corresponds to this person has a key to
Speaker 1: this office and it will unlock. Now with the smartphones,
Speaker 1: you've got the two different magnetic fields that are being generated,
Speaker 1: and that's where you can have this communication passed between
Speaker 1: the two where essentially you have one asking for identification
Speaker 1: and the other one UM making sure that registers that
Speaker 1: it's an actual payment. You know, you have to have
Speaker 1: this work on both sides for this to to take place.
Speaker 1: So um and just in case you're curious, the data
Speaker 1: rates that can transfer between two devices in an NFC system, Uh,
Speaker 1: there are three different data rates that are possible. And
Speaker 1: when you hear how what the speeds are, you gonna think, wow,
Speaker 1: that's pretty slow compared to like an Internet connection, like
Speaker 1: a broadband Internet connection a hundred six killabits per second,
Speaker 1: two twelve kilabits per second, and four four killa bits
Speaker 1: per second. But you gotta keep in mind that the
Speaker 1: amount of information that's being transferred here minuscule. Yes, you know,
Speaker 1: you're talking about some sort of identification, credit card information, um,
Speaker 1: and that's it really and well, purchase price or whatever.
Speaker 1: But it's tiny in comparison to the amount of data
Speaker 1: you get even just loading up a basic web page.
Speaker 1: So you don't really need a super fast data transfer
Speaker 1: rate in order for this to work. So the smartphones
Speaker 1: are using this NFC technology, and the the vendors have
Speaker 1: to use it as well. I mean, obviously, even if
Speaker 1: you've got Google Wallet and you walk into a store,
Speaker 1: there's no guarantee you can use your phone to pay
Speaker 1: for whatever you're buying, the vendor has to also have
Speaker 1: their half of the system in place, right, So yeah,
Speaker 1: you can't just walk up to a cashier and wave
Speaker 1: your phone around and it will pay for it. You
Speaker 1: might get some funny looks or be politely asked to leave,
Speaker 1: or maybe not politely asked to leave. Well, um it does.
Speaker 1: If you've seen the MasterCard pay pass system, UM, then
Speaker 1: there there are actually play says. There's a on the
Speaker 1: Google Wallet UM information site. There is a way to
Speaker 1: look up whether or not they're Google Wallet merchants in
Speaker 1: your area. And basically any place that has that system
Speaker 1: already in place, that system will interact with Google Wallet
Speaker 1: or is this it's supposed to? Um? Plus, there are
Speaker 1: other places to a lot of the stores that you
Speaker 1: might find the malls here UM in the United States,
Speaker 1: and some restaurants UM. You know, places like blooming Gale's
Speaker 1: or American Eagle, Macy's, um Arby's. Yeah, that's true because
Speaker 1: I actually went. Uh. If you go to to Google's
Speaker 1: pages on this, they have a little section where you
Speaker 1: can type in your zip code and see what what
Speaker 1: stores nearby are. UM have that that option and so
Speaker 1: I checked for our office just out of curiosity and
Speaker 1: saw that there was an Arby's. And uh, it's interesting
Speaker 1: because we actually have a couple of really large malls
Speaker 1: near our office, and I didn't see a lot of
Speaker 1: stores in those malls that had adopted us. Now. Granted,
Speaker 1: even though this technology, again the technology itself is not new,
Speaker 1: the product and the service are very new. Uh so
Speaker 1: it's not a huge surprise that there's not a widespread
Speaker 1: adoption yet. But what is interesting to me his Eric
Speaker 1: Schmidt has said that he believes within a year there
Speaker 1: will be widespread adoption. So, based upon the recording of
Speaker 1: this podcast within by June two thousand and twelve, Schmidt
Speaker 1: expects that this NFC approach to paying for goods and
Speaker 1: services will be widespread. I'm holding him to that. It
Speaker 1: would be nice. I mean, especially again we'll get back
Speaker 1: to the offers and everything with Google Wallet to talk
Speaker 1: about how you know that adds value to their their service. Um,
Speaker 1: but uh, I mean it would be nice to know
Speaker 1: that we are no longer kind of in the the
Speaker 1: relatively dark agents technologically speaking, compared to like Japan. I
Speaker 1: know I keep bringing that up, but I mean Japan
Speaker 1: is light years ahead of us as far as the
Speaker 1: mobile technology goes, you know, I mean they're we're catching
Speaker 1: up definitely. And I know that the iPhone is has
Speaker 1: become popular in Japan as well, So it's not like, uh,
Speaker 1: you know they look at our our brand new toys
Speaker 1: and say, man, that was cool five years ago. Well, um, well,
Speaker 1: that's something I want to talk about in a minute.
Speaker 1: There I wanted to bring up before we got away
Speaker 1: from too far away from how it works. I feel
Speaker 1: compelled to point out that there is another step. You
Speaker 1: don't just tap your phone to the pad and you know,
Speaker 1: say thank you very much, here's your receipt. There is
Speaker 1: another step. Now you you might be wondering, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: how does it know it's me? You have to enter
Speaker 1: a pin on your phone. Your phone has to be
Speaker 1: on if it if it is off, if you've run
Speaker 1: out of battery, you've run out of cash or not cash.
Speaker 1: But you know, um yeah, you can't usually can't use
Speaker 1: it anymore because it's got to be able to receive
Speaker 1: a signal. Now you don't have to have a a
Speaker 1: phone signal where you are. So you're in a really
Speaker 1: giant mall um away from a tower, and you're way
Speaker 1: from a tower and you can't get a signal. Why,
Speaker 1: I can't imagine the mall that wouldn't have its self.
Speaker 1: But there's there are places. There are places near where
Speaker 1: I live that are right around the corner where I live,
Speaker 1: and there are certain stores that if you go into it,
Speaker 1: it's like they've built a fair day cage around that
Speaker 1: store because you can't your signal drops like a like
Speaker 1: like a like a stone, like like something that drops
Speaker 1: very like something that it hung in the air, the
Speaker 1: same way bricks. Don't I love that? Um? But yeah,
Speaker 1: you have to you have to be able to identify yourself.
Speaker 1: The phone has to be on for you to complete
Speaker 1: the transaction. UM. As a matter of fact, the uh,
Speaker 1: the information is stored in something that Google is calling
Speaker 1: the Secure Elements. Yes, it's not. It's not connected directly
Speaker 1: to the Android processing chip. That was a very important
Speaker 1: part of Google's presentation. They wanted to make sure that
Speaker 1: everyone understood the what measures they had taken to ensure
Speaker 1: security of this, because you know you could you could
Speaker 1: clearly any time you're talking about transmitting data wirelessly. There's
Speaker 1: this whole fear that there's a way that that data
Speaker 1: could get leaked and compromised. And of course we all
Speaker 1: know that you don't have to transmit data wirelessly in
Speaker 1: order for your information to be compromised. I know this
Speaker 1: from recent personal experience. But um, but any time that
Speaker 1: you see that that medium of exchange, that's one of
Speaker 1: the concerns you have, right. So, yeah, the secure element
Speaker 1: is is completely separate from the Android processor and the
Speaker 1: apps that Google walad app does not directly um access
Speaker 1: the secure element. So, in other words, they wanted to
Speaker 1: make sure that if you were to, say, lose your phone,
Speaker 1: that getting hold of your credit card information would not
Speaker 1: be an easy thing to do. Now, that's not to
Speaker 1: say that some enterprising hacker couldn't figure out a way
Speaker 1: to do it. So even if you were to lose
Speaker 1: your phone, the Google stresses that you should immediately contact
Speaker 1: your your bank or other financial institution, or to change
Speaker 1: your credit cards, canceled them out and get new ones,
Speaker 1: because you know, you never want to just entrust and
Speaker 1: say that something is completely secure from all possible attacks.
Speaker 1: Because we all learned a lesson from Titanic, well, Uly
Speaker 1: Leonardo DiCaprio is dreamy well, and in the case of
Speaker 1: the uh nexus s the secure element is an n
Speaker 1: x p p N six K chip. I'll sure give
Speaker 1: it away now everyone knows. According to Clinton Bolton from
Speaker 1: E Week, UM and yeah, lest you think, as I
Speaker 1: saw in comments on his article, UM, that we are
Speaker 1: necessary early spreading fear, uncertainly, uncertainty and doubt, all otherwise
Speaker 1: known as fud UM. I just I feel compelled to
Speaker 1: report um as other people did. I saw this person
Speaker 1: quoted a couple of times UM McAfee security expert UM
Speaker 1: Jimmy Shaw, who basically was saying that based on what
Speaker 1: he knows the system, it's not that the system isn't
Speaker 1: designed with security in place, he you know, so much
Speaker 1: as he thinks that it might be possible to take
Speaker 1: the authentication key from the Google Wallet application itself and
Speaker 1: uh rite an application that will allow somebody to fool
Speaker 1: the secure element into giving up what it has. It's
Speaker 1: not the secure element that he sees as the weak
Speaker 1: link the app as being reverse engineer able to get
Speaker 1: at whatever the you know your PIN number and just
Speaker 1: it yes, sorry, you know pin? Actually the end of
Speaker 1: the personal number, the personal identification number number, UH your
Speaker 1: Windows phone. Now we're talking to Android I'm sorry. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: they basically they feel that it's possible to do that. Now, um, yes,
Speaker 1: you could say that Google has gone to a lot
Speaker 1: of trouble to ensure that it's not going to be
Speaker 1: easy to make this happen. Um and and and people
Speaker 1: uh who like this idea are probably saying no, you're
Speaker 1: just saying this, and it's it's very unlikely. Yes, it's unlikely,
Speaker 1: but it's possible. It's a good idea to keep that
Speaker 1: in mind. Just like any bank, it's possible that it
Speaker 1: could get robbed. It's likely, but it's possible, and it's
Speaker 1: possible you could have your card skimmed when you go
Speaker 1: to a machine or that it is very possible, and
Speaker 1: you know that there might be a very tiny camera
Speaker 1: recording your movements that you so anyway the but but
Speaker 1: also we should keep in mind that Android phones have
Speaker 1: um have optional or locking systems on them as well.
Speaker 1: So that's as a second level of security, which is
Speaker 1: separate from the Google wallet. Like that's just so that
Speaker 1: you can use your phone. So for example, if you
Speaker 1: were to pick up my phone, you would find out
Speaker 1: that there is a security code that you would need
Speaker 1: to enter in order to access my phone. Now, yes,
Speaker 1: there are ways of getting around that if you know
Speaker 1: how to hack the phone properly. But again it's that
Speaker 1: level of security that discourages you know, a major percentage
Speaker 1: of the people who would otherwise try and take advantage
Speaker 1: of finding your phone. So you know, no security system
Speaker 1: is gonna be perfect, but you try and make it
Speaker 1: strong enough so that the cases are our failures. And
Speaker 1: then again, as I said before, Google does stress that
Speaker 1: you have to let your financial institutions know so that
Speaker 1: you can you can make sure that no one can
Speaker 1: use that card against you. Um. And also they have
Speaker 1: an element in place where it prevents you from creating
Speaker 1: a week password or a weak pen. Yeah, so if
Speaker 1: you were to try doing one one one one as
Speaker 1: your pen so that you wouldn't have to remember it
Speaker 1: whenever you're using Google Wallet, it will reject that and
Speaker 1: make you choose something that's not going to be the
Speaker 1: same digit four times or four sequential digits either up
Speaker 1: or down. That kind of thing. Tony Bradley is sorry,
Speaker 1: Tony Tony Bradley of PC World, Um, it sounds like
Speaker 1: you may have read the same article because it's um
Speaker 1: this one also quoted Jimmy Shaw, uh but um he
Speaker 1: had Bradley spoken with Google specifically about some of these things,
Speaker 1: and Google said that Google Wallet itself does not have
Speaker 1: access to the credit card information uh in the secure element.
Speaker 1: Um so you know, basically they you know, they're they're
Speaker 1: stressing that it really is a secure way of doing this.
Speaker 1: Plus the uh uh. They added that the transceiver is
Speaker 1: off if your your phone screen is off. So as
Speaker 1: long as your screen is off, it is not there's
Speaker 1: no way that it's supposed to be able to transmit information.
Speaker 1: And near field communication works over very short distances. We're
Speaker 1: talking like centimeters so um so, so intercepting that would
Speaker 1: be difficult unless you know everyone's really buddy buddy in
Speaker 1: the stores you're shopping right right. So I do think, um,
Speaker 1: I do think they've put some some good security measures
Speaker 1: in place. I like any kind of electronic transaction, I
Speaker 1: think there's probably some risk involved. There's there's no fail
Speaker 1: proof system out there. But I would say that again
Speaker 1: it I would say that just because yes, there's an
Speaker 1: element where there's a element of risk there, but it's tiny,
Speaker 1: just like there's an element of risk in every kind
Speaker 1: of transaction. You can do yeah, and you know, keep
Speaker 1: in mind that anything that isn't an electronic transfer has
Speaker 1: its own element of risk to it. It may be
Speaker 1: different from the electronic version, but it's still there. So
Speaker 1: no no system is perfect. Even we we found out
Speaker 1: just this week that topic that we recently talked about bitcoin,
Speaker 1: people have been stealing bitcoin. Yeah. I actually did an
Speaker 1: update for our bitcoin podcast because of that. Yes, so
Speaker 1: you'll be hearing. Actually you've already heard that. So when
Speaker 1: you when you unless something has gone terribly wrong, you've
Speaker 1: heard our bitcoin episode and so you will have heard
Speaker 1: the update that I gave at the end of it. Um,
Speaker 1: So did you want to talk about the offers? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I want to talk with very briefly about Google Offers.
Speaker 1: So Google Offers is kind of Google's answer to things
Speaker 1: like group on, scout Mob. There are other lots of
Speaker 1: living social, There are a lot of other services out
Speaker 1: there that offer deals or cop ponds for specific goods
Speaker 1: and services. And these are awesome, right, you know, you
Speaker 1: get this this deal and maybe it's uh, you know,
Speaker 1: it's maybe it's a place that you've never been before
Speaker 1: and you want to check it out. Maybe it's a
Speaker 1: place you go to all the time, and you want
Speaker 1: to be able to use the offer towards some sort
Speaker 1: of goods or service um or maybe you never would
Speaker 1: have thought to go there at all, but this has
Speaker 1: convinced you too, because the deal is just so darn good. Um. Well,
Speaker 1: in most cases with this kind of thing, you you,
Speaker 1: especially if it's a mobile app, you get some sort
Speaker 1: of deal that you have to show at whatever the
Speaker 1: vendor is, you know, whoever is, whoever is offering the
Speaker 1: goods or services. So let's say, for example, I can
Speaker 1: give a specific example. I used a a h an
Speaker 1: app to get discount tickets to a local theater, and
Speaker 1: the stage theater, not a movie theater, And so I
Speaker 1: went to the theater and then I had to pull
Speaker 1: up the app and show that I had activated that
Speaker 1: particular offer, and I showed it at the door and
Speaker 1: they applied the discount and then I got my tickets. Well,
Speaker 1: with Google offers partnered with Google Wallet, it's not always
Speaker 1: going to be the case, because you know, you have
Speaker 1: to have the vendor using the system too. But let's
Speaker 1: say that you have a Google offer for that particular place,
Speaker 1: and you're using Google Wallet to pay for your whatever.
Speaker 1: So let's say I'm going to the theater and they
Speaker 1: have the system there. I could tap my phone to
Speaker 1: that and it would automatically apply that coupon to the
Speaker 1: purchase without me having to do a separate step of
Speaker 1: showing the offer to someone else. And the same is
Speaker 1: true again with the loyalty cards. So you might have
Speaker 1: a particular place you go to a lot and uh,
Speaker 1: you have your loyalty benefits, you have a coupon, and
Speaker 1: you've got this uh, this Google Wallet system. All you
Speaker 1: do is with one tap, you make your purchase and
Speaker 1: everything is applied to that one uh, that one transaction.
Speaker 1: And this is really a compelling service to me because
Speaker 1: it simplifies everything, and you might even get to the
Speaker 1: point where you're not even fully aware of all the
Speaker 1: things that are looped in offers. So, for example, let's
Speaker 1: say there are a lot of grocery stores that have
Speaker 1: the loyalty cards, right, and you get certain deals when
Speaker 1: you go shopping that other people who do who are
Speaker 1: not part of the loyalty program, they don't have access
Speaker 1: to those deals. And let's just say you're going on
Speaker 1: a normal shopping trip and you're not even really paying
Speaker 1: attention as you're purchasing your stuff. You know, you're getting
Speaker 1: the brands you like, and you're getting whatever products you want,
Speaker 1: and you go to check out and you tap your
Speaker 1: phone and if there were any offers, that automatically gets
Speaker 1: applied to whatever it was you were purchasing, and uh
Speaker 1: and again it cuts down on the stuff you have
Speaker 1: to remember to carry with you. So, for example, I
Speaker 1: used my loyalty uh key fob things so much at
Speaker 1: our grocery store that it eventually wore through and broke
Speaker 1: off my key chain. And now I don't have it
Speaker 1: with me all the time because I never bothered to
Speaker 1: replace it because I was like, well, you know, it's
Speaker 1: more walking. Yeah. I actually uh got an app from
Speaker 1: my smartphone that has the ability to put the barcodes
Speaker 1: on the screen. So theoretically you're supposed to just uh
Speaker 1: scan your your phone screen in front of the thing
Speaker 1: and it will read your loyalty card number. I can
Speaker 1: tell you I think probably because of the screen protector
Speaker 1: on my phone, I could never get it to read properly,
Speaker 1: especially on the well on the youth scan lanes that
Speaker 1: you know, I kind of nervous given your phone to
Speaker 1: the cashier. But you know, on the youth scan thing. Well,
Speaker 1: it's just me. I'm gonna get it, you know, right,
Speaker 1: you know, I sat there for ten minutes. The people
Speaker 1: were hitting me behind from behind with oranges and that
Speaker 1: like the old the old days when they first got
Speaker 1: the scanners, and the person would the cashier would scan something.
Speaker 1: Nothing would happen. Scan it, nothing would happened. Scan it,
Speaker 1: nothing would happen. Stop, look at the sticker, put it
Speaker 1: back down, scan it, nothing would happen. Yeah, it's like that, um,
Speaker 1: But a near field communication system would completely scanning, scanning, needing,
Speaker 1: just need to get it close enough to and for vendors,
Speaker 1: for vendors that are participating with Google Offers but are
Speaker 1: not participating with Google Wallet, you would still do the
Speaker 1: scanning thing, right. You would have to open up your
Speaker 1: Google Offers part of your Google Wallet and show off, hey,
Speaker 1: I've got this coupon. So you would still do it
Speaker 1: the older way through that method. But if they are
Speaker 1: working with the Google Wallet system, then again it's just
Speaker 1: one tap and you go, I think it's a sorry
Speaker 1: you were going to say something, Well, you can go
Speaker 1: ahead and say that. I think it's all I was
Speaker 1: just gonna say. I think it's an interesting product and
Speaker 1: I think I think it has a lot of potential. Um,
Speaker 1: I know that there are a lot of other companies
Speaker 1: that are looking into similar ways of doing payments. You've
Speaker 1: also got the other services like group on, You've got
Speaker 1: services like Living Social. They're they're handling the offers side
Speaker 1: of it. They're not necessarily partnered with the payment side
Speaker 1: of it yet, although that may change. Yeah, that's exactly
Speaker 1: where I was gonna go because American Express and UH
Speaker 1: four square are currently working together. UM. Now these are
Speaker 1: with the plastic card not you know, there's not an
Speaker 1: electronic wallet, but you figure with American expresses clout UH,
Speaker 1: they would easily be able to do this. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean you it is the similar situation, just not
Speaker 1: with your phone. If you go with you find the
Speaker 1: deal on four square. When you're out someplace where you
Speaker 1: check in UH and you have your American Express card
Speaker 1: with you and you pay with it, it should automatically, um,
Speaker 1: you know, give you the discount. And that's that's the
Speaker 1: trial they ran out of south By Southwest. And there's
Speaker 1: also a group on now, which is something they're doing
Speaker 1: where it's trying to give you an instant offer rather
Speaker 1: than something that you redeem later, which is traditionally how
Speaker 1: a lot of these deals have worked. Um. And then
Speaker 1: you've got you know, like we of the Nexus S
Speaker 1: four G is on Sprint, and that's the only carrier
Speaker 1: right now that is supporting this whole endeavor. Um. There
Speaker 1: there's also talk that the other major carriers in the
Speaker 1: United States, which of course our A, T and T,
Speaker 1: T Mobile and Verizon, are all working on their own
Speaker 1: NFC proprietary approach to payments, which means that we could
Speaker 1: have a another sort of standards war to determine which
Speaker 1: if any of the four come into uh prominence. And
Speaker 1: you know, so it may be that it's it's a
Speaker 1: divided market where it all depends upon which carrier is
Speaker 1: in charge of your your cell phone plan. So yeah,
Speaker 1: we're still gonna be kind of keeping an eye on this,
Speaker 1: and you know, hopefully we're gonna have systems that will
Speaker 1: go across all carriers so that it makes it simpler
Speaker 1: for everybody. Right because assuming that the the scanning platforms,
Speaker 1: the FC consoles where you tap the phone against it,
Speaker 1: assuming they can read all the different variations of this, well,
Speaker 1: then that would be fine, right because then it wouldn't matter,
Speaker 1: like if the if the vendor end is agnostic toward
Speaker 1: which platform you're using, that would be best. But if
Speaker 1: you go there and you're like, I've got this on
Speaker 1: my phone and you tap it. Oh wait, you're a
Speaker 1: T Mobile customer. Sorry, we only we only use this
Speaker 1: for Sprint, that would be very frustrating from a consumer standpoint,
Speaker 1: to the point where you're like, what's the point of this. So, um,
Speaker 1: it's early days yet, We'll have to see and and uh,
Speaker 1: it's not that I hope that Google is triumphant and
Speaker 1: gets that the total market share for this. Um. I
Speaker 1: think the competition is a great thing. I just want
Speaker 1: to make sure that the competition is such that it
Speaker 1: doesn't hurt the consumer experience. So I want to make
Speaker 1: that clear though, that I'm not trumpeting Google and saying
Speaker 1: I hope that they crush everyone under the heel of
Speaker 1: their enormous school colplex boot. Yeah it's uh, these boots
Speaker 1: were made for Google. It's convenient enough, and people are
Speaker 1: there certainly enough smartphones out there where I think the
Speaker 1: market may be more ripe than it has been in
Speaker 1: the past. Um, but I still think it will will
Speaker 1: take some time. To catch on Bolton, who I mentioned
Speaker 1: earlier from the week. Also, Uh in his article mentioned
Speaker 1: that Uh, in addition to security concerns, he thinks that
Speaker 1: it's possible that basically apathy consumer apathy will win out
Speaker 1: and that none of the you know, Google wallet just
Speaker 1: won't succeed in the long run. Um, I'm not so
Speaker 1: sure that security or apathy are are gonna beat UM
Speaker 1: the convenience of NFC unless there are just some horrific problems.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, with all of it, the hacking
Speaker 1: that's been going on lately, with UM, everybody, with every buddy,
Speaker 1: I just don't know that it's it's going to register.
Speaker 1: You know, at this point, it may ultimately not matter
Speaker 1: if you if you demonstrate that the financial systems aren't
Speaker 1: secure on their end, that doesn't matter what you're carrying
Speaker 1: in your wallet. Yeah, that's whether it's virtual or physical.
Speaker 1: And I mean that's a scary thought. But we've already
Speaker 1: seen it happen. You know, we've seen credit card companies
Speaker 1: get attacked by hackers, and we've seen you know, other
Speaker 1: companies that are not directly connected to financial institutions but
Speaker 1: are indirectly connected. And that's the way in and so yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a scary thing. But I mean and people who
Speaker 1: have been able to decrypt a pin block um that
Speaker 1: they've hacked, which which was at one time considered you know,
Speaker 1: highly secure because you have the credit card number encrypt
Speaker 1: or the debit card number encrypted plus the pin block
Speaker 1: encrypted different separately, and they said, oh, yeah, well with
Speaker 1: that level of security, you're not going to get it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they've found ways to get that. Ever, say that your
Speaker 1: ship is unsinkable, so you can also get mugged on
Speaker 1: the way to the have your cash taken from you.
Speaker 1: So the message you should take from this episode is
Speaker 1: the world is dangerous and they're all out to get you. So,
Speaker 1: if you guys have any other topics you would like
Speaker 1: us to talk about on tech Stuff, you can let
Speaker 1: us know on Facebook or Twitter or handled there as
Speaker 1: tech Stuff h s W, or you can send us
Speaker 1: an email That address is tech stuff at how stuff
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