We did it — we made it to 2023! As you begin the new year, use this as a chance to finally ditch your physical wallet and embrace Apple Pay.
In the early 2000s, the U.S. started accepting contactless payments at credit card terminals, which used near-field communication (NFC) technology to make it happen. However, it was still too early and not widely adopted until 2008, when the major credit card companies began to offer contactless credit cards.
But contactless payments continued to evolve. Soon enough, Apple added Apple Pay in 2014, allowing you to add your credit and debit cards in the digital Wallet app and pay with your phone. There is also Google Pay for Android devices, and even Samsung has its own version of mobile payments called Samsung Pay.
Over the holidays, I was shocked to learn that my mother-in-law never used Apple Pay for the reason that she simply didn’t trust how those systems work. But the truth of the matter is that digital wallets, like Apple Pay and Google Pay, are much safer and more secure than using a physical card. And as we step into 2023, it’s time you ditch your real wallet for a virtual one.
I was flabbergasted when I learned some of my in-laws don’t trust digital payments or wallets and think it’s worse than the plastic itself. They couldn’t be more wrong!
The problem with a physical card is the fact that someone could easily obtain the details of your card through skimming devices, either installed on a payment terminal waiting for the unsuspecting or through RFID. The latter appears less common these days, despite the fact that many bag and wallet makers use “RFID blocking” as a selling point, but those skimming devices can be easily installed on various point-of-sale devices without anyone seeing or noticing. If you swipe or insert your card in one of those skimmers, a thief can obtain your card information and use it to make purchases, create fake credit cards, or even sell the information on the dark web.
With digital payments through something like Apple Pay, you don’t need to worry about any of that. Before you can even make a payment, it needs to be authenticated with either Face ID or Touch ID on the device.
