Amazon hands customers palm-based payment option in more stores
Amazon will soon offer its Amazon One contactless payment device at eight Seattle-area stores.
Initially introduced at two Seattle-area Amazon Go stores in September 2020, Amazon One is a proprietary technology designed to let customers use their unique palm signature to pay or present a loyalty card at a store. Currently, Amazon provides Amazon One payment at five select Amazon Go, Amazon Go Grocery, Amazon Books and Amazon 4-star stores in and around Seattle. Starting Monday, Feb. 1, the retailer is offering Amazon One at an additional Amazon Go store in Seattle, and will expand the technology to two more Seattle Amazon Go locations in the coming weeks.
To sign up for Amazon One, first customers insert their credit card in an in-store Amazon One device or kiosk. Next, they hover their palm over the device and enter their mobile phone number to complete sign-up.
Since no two palms are exactly alike, customers can register both palms. A process of proprietary imaging and computer vision algorithms capture and encrypt the customer’s palm image, including tiny, distinct features on and below the surface, many that are indiscernible to the human eye or a standard camera. In seconds, a process of proprietary imaging and computer vision algorithms capture and encrypt a customer’s palm image. Amazon One uses the information embedded in a customer’s palm to create a unique palm signature that it can read each and every time the customer uses it.
A customer’s Amazon One ID is created when they sign up at an Amazon One device, and it contains their palm signatures, payment information, and contact information. To view Amazon One information online, including personal transaction history, customers can click the link in the welcome message they received when they first created their Amazon One ID and sign in with their Amazon account.
Amazon One is protected by multiple security controls and palm images are never stored on the device, but are encrypted and sent to a secure area Amazon custom-built in the cloud where it creates palm signatures. Customers can request to delete data associated with Amazon One through the device itself or via the Amazon One online customer portal.
“Since launching Amazon One a few months ago, we’ve heard great feedback from customers who say how easy it is to enroll and how much they like having Amazon One as a contactless option that makes their shopping trips even faster and more convenient,” said Dilip Kumar, VP, physical retail & technology at Amazon. “We’re excited to bring Amazon One to more customers at more of our store locations in the Seattle area.”