A Chicago startup has built a biometrics-based payments system that lets people make purchases by holding their hands over a scanner at the point-of-sale.
To sign up for the Keyo system, shoppers create an account online, receive a registration code and then visit a retail location with one of the firm's terminals to enter the code and map the unique blood vessel patterns in their palms.
They can then add cards and make purchases at participating retailers by waving their hands over the Keyo terminals and then selecting the payment method. An online and app-based dashboard lets customers view their purchases, manage their cards and receive rewards.
The service has been built by husband and wife Jaxon Klein and Cayetana Polanco, along with friend Delna Sepoy Straus, using hardware from Fujitsu, which has been using biometric vein technology for ATMs in Japan for several years.
According to local news site Chicago Inno, the system is currently being tested with a couple of Chicago retailers, with plans afoot for a wider beta involving 30 sites, charging a flat one per cent fee on transactions.
Klein tells Chicago Inno: "We really see a future without keys, cards, wallets, IDs and tickets."
Keyo is far from the first firm to investigate biometric-based POS payments. Earlier this London music venue Proud Camden took the wraps off a similar system, called FingoPay, from biometric company Sthalerm, while India's Yes Bank has built a POS device that uses iris scanning technology.