Apple promises that you will be able to pay by waving your iPhone in front of a pay terminal in some popular US shops. Amazing, so I spent the last 48 hours understanding this new technology, finding loopholes, hacking a bit or two and of course putting my solution to the test.
I wanted to find a way to use my existing Android phone to make a contactless payment and to make it even more challenging I had to do this in Europe…
It's done ladies and gentlemen. I proudly present the Android hack to Apple Pay. For now I'll call it iPayD after I Paid with a Droid
As most Android phones don't have a fingerprint reader that was the first thing we had to circumvent. Well, that wasn't too hard after all. Turned out to be unnecessary.
Next problem is that my trusty Android doesn't contain a unique Apple created credit card number equivalent. Or something like it as I couldn't find any store actually accepting Apple Pay here in Europe so this part is a bit vague.
Never mind, I resolutionary rethought the problem and learned everything I wanted to know from sites like the Verge. They explained that pulling a credit card from your wallet, swiping it and returning it, was hard work and should be replaced by just waving your phone in front of the stunned cashier.
How to do this with just some simple Droid? The solution I came up with after lots of research could be privileged information under your local law, could well be covered by patent laws or DRM regulations so please memorize and destroy this text.
First thing, get your credit (or debit card) from your wallet. Relax, you'll only have to do this once. Now check if it's a NFC enabled card. Most are in Europe anno 2014, but if you have an older one, ask your bank to replace it.
Now, and this is the tricky part, put that card at the back of your phone case. Just slide it in at the back between the phone and the case and leave it there face up. This will be the new permanent setup and key to this hack.
Now step forward to the cashier 'phone drawn' and wave in front of the machine. Don't touch. This is high tech wizardry in the making. Just wave that hacked android. The cashier's machine will possibly bleep to welcome you. Don't be afraid, that's good news.
Now step forward, sign the slip and off you go. You paid without ever having to draw your wallet and without the need for a new iPhone. Now how amazing is that?
(pssst if the amount is under 25E you don't even have to sign in most Euro countries. If you don't say 'iPaiD' to the cashier it will be a truly contactless payment 🙂
P.S. for the technically minded the hack involves NFC (complex tech, but rest assured available on most Androids), phone cases (slightly lower tech, some Android users don't have them, but iPhone people will always protect their phones with one. Can be obtained for $2) and the courage to say iPayD instead of Apple Pay. #Tech
LOL
From reports on the news , this would be a dangerous move to make. Apple have promised to make their security safer, but then, they have made such statements before with little effect.
Oh boy, I can feel the laweyrs lining up… You dirty hacker… 🙂 🙂 🙂
I removed my iCloud before I dared to post this +Luis Carvalho Don't want to be seen naked.
Truth is…. why give your cards details to apple when you already have NFC on your wallet?
+Max Huijgen smart move that one… (I will not ask why you had nude photos of yourself, much less in an iCloud, I'll refrain to even mention it, it's TMI, obviously I mean the iCloud part.)
Don't really want to talk about it +Luis Carvalho but it was the GF…
I sincerely hope this "hack" was firmly tongue-in-cheek.
Amazing! This hack also works with the iPhone 4, no need to upgrade.
All you need now is a hacker name. I say [MaX¬hUi]
Does Jennifer Lawrence's pics come with the app?
Beware of "Card Clash" though. Especially if you have an Oyster card, a debit card and two credit cards stuffed down the back of your droid. These are not the cards your contactless payment system is looking for.
Note also that pick pockets who grab your phone to trade for their next hit of crack will get a bonus surprise. Call that one iWeep.
BTW. When will Apple Pay support chip and pin?
Hey that is quite nice! I always wanted to pay with a shoe, this hack also works with a shoe!!
LMAO!
you should have posted this hack when the google wallet was introduced … (android user who hates bulling apple)
If Google Wallet did not catch on will Apple Pay, only time will tell
I found the act of taking out my phone too much of a hassle, so decided to go for the watch option. I didn't have an IWatch or anything but this hack works perfectly on my analog watch, although bending my wrist hurts, but it's alpha, bound to have bugs. Thanks!
So get a spare card, x-ray it so you can see where the chip and aerial wires are, then cut it down with scissors. Then sellotape it to the back of your watch.
Actually that's not so crazy. Just like with SIMs and Micro-Sims (SD and Micro-SD), maybe we can persuade the card issuers to do a new format credit/debit card that is half the size. With a replaceable caddy so it can still be used in existing card readers. I wonder if it needs to be any bigger than the contacts on a standard chip and pin ready card.
The limitation in size is the readability of the number 🙂 +Julian Bond
+Jeremy Granger It turns out that the "U2 album" that Apple is distributing is actually "you too, nude", celebrating last week's nude celebrity hack.
Ah, that spam album people were complaining about on twitter.
I'm thinking of porting this to Windows Phone…
Neat
So..you hacked something, what is not available?
What happened to tap to pay
Apple xD jeez
Obviously apple set up a really secure system… Not
Really? Somebody hacks something what is not published and works. Simply its a lie dude
I'm sorry +Karel Jurecka but I do think it would work 😉
Trollolol
+Max Huijgen the u.s. is still solidly on magstripe, and ever since the target and home depot breaches the payments networks et al. Are freaking out over the fraud liability.
So there is a lot of room for improvement, and it looks like the u.s. will jump straight from magstripe to mobile/nfc, skipping the European nfc physical cards generation almost entirely.
Catch details here, this isn't just an Apple thing, in fact Google has been supplying much of the payment 1x token tech.
http://www.finextra.com/blogs/fullblog.aspx?blogid=9925
Afaik Apple's solution still expects physical cards to exist +Alex Schleber
+Max Huijgen for now, but you're sort of supposed to shred them (or put into a safe) after entry into the phone?
The next step is clearly to get rid of the physical cards altogether.
Or you could have just been using Google wallet, from any NFC enabled android phone, for like the past several years haha… Whatever floats your boat.