Google today announced the official launch of Android Pay in the United States where users can now pay on 1 million locations with their Android phone. Android Pay works on all Android phones with Near Field Communication (NFC) chips that run at least Android Kitkat 4.4.
The payment service can be used by updating the Google Wallet app. Android Pay will support credit and debit cards from the four major payment networks: American Express, Discover, MasterCard and Visa. These cards are issued by many of the most popular US banks and credit unions, including American Express, Bank of America, Discover, Navy Federal Credit Union, PNC, Regions Bank, USAA, and U.S. Bank. Citi and Wells Fargo will be available in the next few days, Capital One is coming soon.
Google stresses the service is security, the technology giant writes on its blog, "Android Pay is supported by industry standard tokenization. This means your real credit or debit card number isn't sent with your payment. Instead, we’ll use a virtual account number that provides an extra layer of security."
When a purchase is made a payment confirmation is provided that shows where a given transaction happened to make it easy to catch any suspicious activity.
When a phone with Android Pay is stolen or lost, Google recommends to use the Android Device Manager to lock the phone, or wipe it remotely.
Android Pay is a large competitor for Apple's payment service Apple Pay which is currently only available in the United States and United Kingdom.
