hey there to make a long long long story short, me and a few of my engineering friends are looking into the viability of makeing a implant that works similer to how some companys let you merge multiple cards into one, there are a few things we need to work out and ive just send the basic documentation off to one of my enginerring friends, if you have any expertise in this kinda of area, i would love to hear you input on the situation. this implant would work in the fact that it uses your phone as a backend, just like the other companys.
im not going to put out too much information out there on how it would work and the details of the project as nothing is final, not has it even been started yet. the project title is project Bioframe, hope to hear back from you guys, ill mostlilkly be setting up an area to chat in private so if you prefer that send me a message and ill add u on discord. ( working mainly as of right now for the uk only planning on expanding to other countries later on down the road if things work out how i think they might)
I’d be willing to help. I’m very knowledgeable in antenna and PCB design. I highly doubt you’ll be able to get something working though. Android uses host card emulation to actively transmit card details, and everything is handled in the EMV backend using a system called tokenization. We have everything set up for the apex to be a passive tokenized payment device like the Apple watch, but Mastercard and Visa won’t allow it in an implant form factor. You’d have to lie and say your device was a payment accessory, but when they found out they would deactivate all the devices
That’s the point unfortunately. Wearables are functionally identical to implants as far as design, and they’re allowed. It’s just the implant form factor that they explicitly do not allow because of fear or PR backlash. Mastercard and Visa are global companies though. You can certainly try and negotiate with them, or approach another issuer like American Express or Discover, but ultimately they’re all operating under the EMVCo spec. It’s gatekeeping in the most extreme sense of the word I’ve ever witnessed, because ultimately their decisions are the global economy.
Legitimately is the only way you’re going to get tokenization working, which means the implant “won’t expire”. Otherwise everything illegitimate is a conversion, and all of those expire.
How bad would it be if we all started making requests to allow implants? Like would it hurt the cause at all? If we got people sending in letters requesting the feature maybe they won’t be as concerned with PR because of the interest they’re receiving
Personally I think it would either be ineffective or harmful. They want as little attention on this as possible, they don’t want a social media shit storm coming their way because one influencer posted to their 7 million followers about Mastercard microchipping people with the mark of the beast.
We can’t even muster 1 million people interested in implanted payment and willing to participate, and their customer base is in the billions. It seems from in email threads and calls I’ve been involved in with Amal that the only way we’re going to get this done legitimately is to fly low under the radar and hope the right person in the right place at the right time allows it when we have all our ducks in a row.
Have you ever seen that episode of The Orville where they go to a planet where everybody has an up-vote and down-vote button and if you get enough down-votes you get lobotomized?
I feel like that’s how corporations view social media. That’s why they’re willing to lobby to infringe on free speech. They can lose 100 million dollars in value for their shareholders overnight because of the actions of one influential rando.
We can’t compete with that level of corporate concern (fear, I guess?). We don’t have enough people or represent enough value to actually make much of a difference in their decision making process. We just need to hope the dragon stays asleep long enough for us to make off with some of their gems.
just to clarify… the banks are the “issuers” but MC/Visa/AMEX/etc. are known as “payment networks”… and they literally call themselves “payment schemes” in the industry. schemes. it couldn’t be more on the nose.
also it is the network operators themselves who are standing in the way… emvco simply sets standards so a terminal can read an amex just as well as a mastercard and there isn’t a need for separate terminals for each network… and that all payment instruments play nice with all payment terminals… at least that’s the goal.
anyways as @Satur9 said… there is no “forcing the issue” with them… the scheme is a top-down hierarchy where they have all the control over what happens on their network… anyone steps out of line or doesn’t tow the line, entire swaths of the ecosystem can be shut down on a whim from one of these networks… and they have done it before. Just the small buzz Walletmor created forced MC to investigate and it caused serious ripples in the payment industry… people lost jobs… suppliers blocked out Walletmor…
Here in canada we have debit cards that are directly tied to our bank accounts. They can also use “tap” for under 100$ purchases.
The bank cards don’t expire.
I was considering sending one in for a conversion - but we are only issued one at a time. So I would be cashless for the duration of the conversion.
haha you youngsters don’t know about this, but for a time US banks had “bank cards” as well that you could use with point of sale and “credit card” machines… this was before MC/Visa got their hooks into the US bank card game… but basically US “debit cards” are the only bank cards in the world that are tied to the MC/Visa networks… in literally every other country in the world, bank cards operate on their own networks… in Australia its EFTPS and in Canada its Interac… and these operate under EMV specifications for RF performance and communication protocols, but they have nothing to do with “signature networks” like Mastercard and Visa… and I don’t believe my RBC bank card expires either.
The one risk / down side is that they are super quick to deactivate a card for just about any reason… and yes you can only have one at a time… but if you can manage to get one converted, it would be a viable option for an implant that could have an extremely long life. Not indefinite, because there are other factors like security events or algorithm end-of-life events that force card swaps for customers, but those are rare.
The only other down side is international portability is not typically supported. Can you use your bank card in the US for example? When I use my US bank debit card it operates as a Mastercard credit card when in Canada.
i cannot. it’s a pain in the ass.
even using my credit cards down there, i have to enter my zip code - which works out to 000265 (T2A6G5) [AS AN EXAMPLE]
im gonna call my bank and see if i can get another card. im pretty charming so i think i can… but who knows.
