Photo: Viken Kantarci / Getty Images
A British-Polish company, Walletmor, has started selling chips that can be implanted in the skin and work as a “payment microchip”. It is a miniature device, smaller than a grain of rice and when you bring your hand closer to a payment machine, it will have the same function as a payment card.
The implant can be used to make any type of payment, as long as the business accepts “contactless payments” , that is, those where you do not have to insert the credit card payment at a machine. This was stated by Wojtek Paprota, the founder of Walletmor.
This is high-frequency, short-range wireless communication technology that allows two devices exchange information. It is like the NFC that smartphones also use or what they call “near field communication”. That is, it is not exactly the radio frequency technology of credit cards.
Patrick Paumen, is a Dutchman who carries the implant in his hand, and says to cause a sensation every time he approaches his hand to a bank terminal to pay.
“The reactions of the cashiers are priceless” says Paumen when narrating his experience, who also assures that the procedure is not painful.
For its part, the company Walletmor has insisted on explaining the benefits of this technology. And on his Instagram account he explains how the implant works
There is no doubt that all the answers to the possible fear of implanting a chip that works as a payment method can be resolved if you contact them directly. All the information is in the company link: Walletmor, the world’s first payment implant.
The biggest concern of the interested parties is whether these implants will contain “too much ” personal information and if later with the advancement of technology they could be used to “track people”.
“Chip implants contain the same type of technology that people use on a daily basis”, says Paumen, the man who has had the implant since 2019.
So it seems that it is just another way of “exchanging data”, so perhaps we will have to choose between: the comfort of carrying a method of payment implanted in your skin, or the security of not using another chip with which you can be traced in some way. This will be left to personal preference.
In a survey carried out by a consultant gave as a result that a 51% of a sample of 4,04 people in the UK would consider using this type of implant.
Similarly, some people have already agreed to use this type of implant to carry the passport vaccine against Covid; or there is also the case of key rings or locator chips for animals or objects.