CaliExpress by Flippy, an automated fast food restaurant in Pasadena, Calif., opened in January to much fanfare thanks to its robot burger makers, but the eatery also introduced a less-heralded innovation: the option to pay for your meal with your face.
CaliExpress employs a payment system developed by PopID, a facial ID technology business. To activate it, users must register with a selfie. Then they can choose to be recognized, and PopID’s facial verification completes the transaction.
CaliExpress by Flippy, an automated fast food restaurant in Pasadena, Calif., opened in January to much fanfare thanks to its robot burger makers, but the eatery also introduced a less-heralded innovation: the option to pay for your meal with your face.
CaliExpress employs a payment system developed by PopID, a facial ID technology business. To activate it, users must register with a selfie. Then they can choose to be recognized, and PopID’s facial verification completes the transaction.
It isn’t the only fast-food establishment to use the technology. Steak ‘N Shake, a Midwest-based fast-casual restaurant chain, began implementing facial recognition kiosks in its 300 locations in January. According to the chain, utilizing PopID takes two to three seconds, whereas checking in with a QR code or smartphone app can take up to 20 seconds.
Biometric payment solutions are getting more popular. Amazon debuted pay-by-palm technology in 2020, and while its cashier-less retail experiment failed, the technology was put at 500 Whole Foods locations last year. Mastercard, in collaboration with PopID, launched a test for face-based payments in Brazil in 2022, and it was rated a success, with 76% of pilot participants saying they would recommend the technology to a friend. Late last year, Mastercard announced a partnership with NEC to introduce its Biometric Checkout Program to the Asia-Pacific area.
“Our focus on biometrics as a secure way to verify identity, replacing the password with the person, is at the heart of our efforts in this area,” said Dennis Gamiello, executive vice president of identity products and innovation at MasterCard. He noted that, based on the pilot’s favorable feedback and study, the checkout technology will be introduced to other new markets later this year.
As retailers use biometric technology for a number of purposes, ranging from payments to broader anti-theft systems, consumer backlash and litigation are increasing. In March, an Illinois lady sued Target, alleging that the business illegally collected and stored her and other customers’ biometric data using facial recognition technology without their permission. Amazon and T-Mobile are also facing legal action about biometric technologies.
Other countries, most notably China, have more mature biometric payment systems, with visitors to McDonald’s in China able to pay for their orders using facial recognition technology, as well as systems offered by AliPay, which launched biometric payment in 2015 and began testing the technology at KFC locations in China in 2018.
According to John Miller, CEO of PopID, a recent contract with JPMorgan is a portent of things to come in the United States, as well as what he believes will be a “breakthrough” year for pay-by-face technology.
The consumer case is related to the increasing relevance of loyalty programs. To receive rewards at most quick-service restaurants, customers must enter their loyalty information, which includes bringing out their phone, opening an app, finding the link to the loyalty QR code, and then showing the QR code to the cashier or reader. Consumers normally have two options for payment: pull out their wallet, select a credit card, and then dip or touch the card, or bring out their phone, open it using Face ID, and then present it to the reader. Miller claims that PopID simplifies this procedure by needing only one tap of an on-screen button and a brief look at a camera for loyalty check-in and payment.
“We believe our partnership with JPMorgan is a watershed moment for biometric payments as it represents the first time a leading merchant acquirer has agreed to push biometric payments to its merchant customers,” Miller stated. “JPMorgan brings the kind of credibility and assurance that both merchants and consumers need to adopt biometric payments.”
Consumers are becoming increasingly familiar with biometric technology. According to a PYMENTS poll conducted in 2023, the majority still prefer fingerprint scans to facial recognition, but age remains an important consideration. Consumers in Generation Z are more amenable to facial recognition than fingerprint scanning or password entry.
Juniper Research predicts that global biometric payments would expand by more than 100% between 2024 and 2028, reaching $3 trillion in mobile, biometric-secured payments by 2025.
To be sure, security issues and the hacking of biometric data as a result of its sharing will continue to be crucial in the evolving usage and discourse.
Sheldon Jacobson, a computer science professor at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign, sees biometric identification as part of a technological continuum that has progressed from credit card payments to smartphones. “The next natural step is to simply use facial recognition,” he stated.
He dismisses concerns about privacy and facial recognition as overstated. “We voluntarily give up our privacy all the time,” Jacobson explained. “We post on Facebook and use social media, and we are essentially giving up our privacy.” I continuously tell folks that everything about you is already out there.
