Developer(s) Samsung Electronics License Proprietary | Operating system | |
Initial release August 20, 2015; 19 months ago (2015-08-20) Platform Selected Samsung Galaxy smartphones and Gear smartwatches Website samsung.com/sec/samsung-pay/ (South Korea)
samsung.com/us/samsung-pay/ (U.S.A.)
samsung.com/cn/samsung-pay/ (China)
samsung.com/es/samsung-pay/ (Spain)
samsung.com/sg/samsung-pay/ (Singapore)
samsung.com/au/samsung-pay/ (Australia)
samsung.com/latin/samsung-pay/ (Latin America)
samsung.com.br/samsungpay (Brazil)
samsung.com/ru/samsung-pay/ (Russia)
samsung.com/th/samsung-pay/ (Thailand)
pages.samsung.com/ca/samsungpay/English/ (Canada - English)
pages.samsung.com/ca/samsungpay/French/ (Canada - French)
samsung.com/my/samsung-pay/ (Malaysia)
www.samsung.com/in/samsung-pay/ (India)
www.samsung.com/se/pay (Sweden) | ||
Samsung Pay is a mobile payment and digital wallet service by Samsung Electronics that lets users make payments using compatible phones and other Samsung-produced devices. The service supports contactless payments using near-field communications, but also incorporates an electromagnetic transmission system that allows contactless payments to be used on payment terminals that only support magnetic stripe cards.
Contents
The service was launched in South Korea on August 20, 2015 and in the United States on September 28 of the same year. In 2016 at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES 2016), the telecommunications company announced that Samsung Pay would be coming soon to a variety of banks in Australia, Brazil, Spain and Singapore.
Service
Samsung Pay was developed from the intellectual property of LoopPay, a crowdfunded startup company that Samsung acquired in February 2015. The service supports both NFC-based mobile payment systems (which are prioritized when support is detected), as well as those that only support magnetic stripes. This is accomplished via technology known as "Magnetic Secure Transmission" (MST), which transmits card data to a payment terminal's swipe slot using an electromagnetic field, causing the terminal to register it as if it were a normal magnetic stripe. LoopPay's developers stated that because of this design, the technology would work with "nearly 90%" of all point-of-sale units in the United States (which excludes terminals that require the card to be physically inserted into a slot in order to function).
On phones, the Samsung Pay menu is launched by swiping from the bottom of the screen. Different credit, debit and loyalty cards can be loaded into the app, and selected by swiping between them on-screen.
In South Korea, Samsung Pay can be used for online store payments and to withdraw money on selected banks' ATMs.
Security
Samsung Pay's security measures are based on Samsung Knox and ARM TrustZone technologies; credit card information is stored in a secure token. Payments must be authenticated using a fingerprint scan.
In August 2016, security researcher Salvador Mendoza disclosed a potential flaw with Samsung Pay, arguing that its security tokens were not sufficiently randomized and could become predictable. He also designed a handheld device that could be used to skim magnetic secure transmission tokens, and another which could spoof magnetic stripes on actual card readers using the token. Samsung responded to the report, stating that "If at any time there is a potential vulnerability, we will act promptly to investigate and resolve the issue".
Availability
In May 2016, it was reported that Samsung was developing a spin-off of the service known as Samsung Pay Mini. This service will be used for online payments only, and is also being targeted as a multi-platform service.
In January 2017, Samsung has confirmed that Samsung Pay Mini will not only work on its Galaxy devices, but on other Android phones as well, as long as they are running Android Lollipop or above and have a screen resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels or higher.
Galaxy S
Galaxy Note
Galaxy A
Galaxy C and others
Available to Samsung Pay users inside China.