According to the Wall Street Journal, Google is to collaborate with MasterCard and Citigroup to embed NFC tech into Android phones. This would see anyone with a MasterCard or Citigroup debit/credit card able to pay with a wave of their Androidphone on a VeriFone cashpoint reader.
Google won’t take any money from the customer, but will give them an awful lot of data about customers’ buying habits. This data will be passed onto the retailers, so they can advertise better and even offer discounts when those customers are within close proximity to a branch.
There are already a couple of NFC Androids in the wild – or soon to be released, anyway – but there will be plenty more hitting stores this year using Google’s NFC tech. Not to mention the upcoming BlackBerry models with inbuilt NFC, and possibly an iPhone too. [WSJ]