“DoCoMo itself is part of the working group, of course; and it’s joined by other big names like Fujitsu, Lenovo, Nok Nok Labs, NXP Semiconductors, Yahoo Japan, and The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, among others.” The FIDO Alliance has launched a new working group focused on expanding the consortium’s presence in Japan. Aptly called the FIDO…
BIO-key has signed up a big new distributor in the APAC region. Called Shinden Hightex Corporation, it’s a Japan-based electronic components seller specializing in semi-conductor, RFID, and LCD products. According to a statement from BIO-key, the company counts Sony, Toshiba, NEC, and Panasonic among its clients, and brings in over $450 million in annual revenues.…
Apple Pay has gone live in Japan, albeit with some hiccups. While the platform’s pioneering use of Touch ID fingerprint scanning to confirm transactions has helped to popularize the ease of use of mPayments for increasing numbers of customers around the world, compatibility issues with IT infrastructure from partner JR East has caused some difficulty…
Authorities in Japan have set a launch date for trials of their biometric payments system. It will go live in certain areas starting October 1st. The concept first came to light this past spring with reports that the Japanese government, together with Dai Nippon Printing and Deloitte Tohmatsu Consulting, was exploring technology that would allow…
Two Japanese financial services companies have contracted Daon, together with NTT Data Corporation, to develop multimodal biometric authentication platforms. The agreements aim to have such systems go live for Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (SMFG) and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC) in the spring of next year. SMFG plans to use Daon’s IdentityX Platform, which has…
Japan’s Ogaki Kyoritsu Bank is getting ready to offer palm vein authentication to all of its customers across Osaka, Tokai, and Tokyo, reports The Asahi Shimbun. The bank first introduced the scanners at select ATMs back in 2012, largely in response to the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami. Many customers lost their usual identification documents…
Concert promoters in Japan are starting to use facial recognition technology to issue tickets. It’s meant to cut down wait times and also offers security benefits, with pre-enrolled fans able to pick up their tickets automatically after a face scan. As The Japan Times reports, the system is currently in use by promoters affiliated with the…
Apple’s newly announced devices, the iPhone 7, iPhone 7 Plus, and Apple Watch Series 2, will launch internationally in late-September, and when they arrive in Japan, they’ll come with Apple Pay. The mobile payment platform should get a big push in the country, too, thanks to a partnership between Apple and the JR East transit…
A Japan-based rugged smartphone maker is taking advantage of biometric technology from Fingerprint Cards and Precise Biometrics to enable fingerprint scanning on its newest device. In statements announcing the integration, both FPC and Precise Biometrics declined to name the OEM in question. But FPC did specify that its FPC1140 sensor model has been integrated into…
“It’s a concept similar to a fingerprint scan-based system currently being explored by the Japanese government that would allow tourists to make biometric payments during the Tokyo 2020 Olympics…” One of Japan’s biggest banks, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, or SMFG, is exploring the use of facial recognition as a substitute for payment cards, reports The Yomiuri…
The Japanese startup developing the biometric payment technology to be used during the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo is hoping to reach a much broader market. Called Liquid Inc., the company is working on a system that would link a user’s payment account information directly to her fingerprint, thereby allowing her to confirm a purchase with…
NEC Corporation is testing out a biometric payment solution at its main office building in Tokyo. It’s based on facial recognition, linking individuals’ faces to their payment information. In a trial project that started at the end of last month and is expected to run until the end of August, NEC employees are paying via…
Japan has agreed to donate about $1.96 million USD to Pakistan for the procurement of biometric security screening technology. The money will find its way back to Japan, of course: The deal is meant to encourage the Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority, or CAA, to purchase Japanese facial recognition technology, which in turn would enable biometric…
New details are emerging about the Japanese government’s plan to substitute tourists’ fingerprints for their payment cards. The project was announced earlier this month, and entails connecting visitors’ biometric data to their financial information so that they can make easily make payments at tourist hotspots without having to fill out complicated tax exemption forms; it would…
Japanese authorities are preparing to test out biometric payments for a potentially large-scale deployment. The system will confirm payment transactions by scanning two fingerprints simultaneously. It’s a project being spearheaded by the government as a means of improving tourism ahead of the 2020 Olympics and Paralympics. The electronic, biometric payment system would automatically deduct taxes,…
Japan’s government is pursuing facial biometric technology for its border security. In its latest budget, the country’s Justice Ministry is looking to get about $2.69 million in funding for such a system to be implemented at its national airports. While the country’s security forces are already starting to use extensive biographic profiling of visitors as…
Facial recognition seems to be coming into play in the sale of concert tickets for a popular Japanese boy band. Tickets for the Arashi Live Tour 2015 Japonism have evidently been hard to come by given Arashi’s appeal in the country, and there are now reports surfacing that fans are being asked to submit photos…
Facial recognition technology is increasingly being adopted by business in Japan, and that’s cause for concern about privacy issues, according to an article by Masako Wakae and Yomiuri Shimbun on The Japan News. Such concerns are proving particularly worrisome as a the National Shoplifting Prevention Organization, a nonprofit group, considers sharing the facial biometric data of alleged…