Zwipe – A world without pins and passwords

Norwegian Zwipe has created the world’s most power efficient, secure fingerprint algorithm. Based on this algorithm, the company is now developing the world’s first fingerprint authenticated contactless payment card: the Zwipe MasterCard. With this PIN code free solution the company promises the possibility of a one second payment process.

A vision of a PIN, password and signature free future
In 2009 the Norwegian innovator Kim Kristian Humborstad founded Zwipe based on the conviction that fingerprints will someday be all people need to identify themselves, pay for groceries, get access to their homes and offices and so on. With their fingerprint technique Zwipe wishes to challenge the status quo of identity verification.

An acclaimed technique with a beneficial twist
Fingerprint authentication has been here for a long time. Lately we have witnessed it for instance on mobile phones, computers and and tablets.

“People are already pretty familiar with fingerprint scanning for example due to the iPhone, and it is becoming a lot more common. We believe we have hit the market at the right time.” Kim Kristian Humborstad, Founder and CEO  

Common for these other well known techniques are that they are dependent on the battery source of the device. The Zwipe technique however, is based on the realization that not all platforms can be powered by battery. Therefore the company has been focusing on developing an algorithm which is able to harvest all the energy it needs to perform a fingerprint authentication from standard infrastructure.

“The Zwipe concept does not need any batteries. Instead the card has a proprietary RF based harvest technology, taking energy from the NFC terminal. So when you hold the card near any NFC terminal it will then power the card. This technique enables us to make it ISO format which is as thin as current credit cards.” Kim Kristian Humborstad, Founder and CEO

Payment made easy – and secure
The crucial advantage of the Zwipe Mastercard is security and this amounts to both the consumer and the retailer. Kirsten Pflomm explains how the security factor is a win-win situation for both parts:

“A consumer who has a Zwipe MasterCard does not have to worry about the wrong person using their credit card. In the past you had to call the credit card company and cancel the card if it got lost or stolen. But with Zwipe MasterCard nobody but the owner can use it. And the same goes for the retailer because the retailer can sometimes be left responsible for fraudulent transactions. This allows for both the consumer and the merchant to benefit from more secure technology.” Kim Kristian Humborstad, Founder and CEO

Ajay Bhalla, President of Enterprise Security Solutions at MasterCard also comments on the security issue in a newly released press release:

“Safety and security in everyday payments is at the heart of MasterCard’s business. Our challenge is to ensure the technology offers robust security, simplicity of use and convenience for the customer. Zwipe’s first trial is a significant milestone and its results are very encouraging.” – Kim Kristian Humborstad, Founder and CEO

The next generation
Zwipe is currently working on the next and final generation of the card which they expect to release on a global scale towards the middle and end of 2015. This will be the same format as a standard credit card and it is designed to work with all payment terminals.

“For the retailer there is no additional infrastructure upgrade, because it uses existing chip and PIN NFC terminals. So as long as the retailer has that then their customers can use their Zwipe MasterCard” – Kim Kristian Humborstad, Founder and CEO