Here's How Visa Plans to Keep Your Credit Cards Safe in Apple Pay

Apple is gearing up to launch its first mobile payments system, Apple Pay, which will allow you to make purchases with the iPhone 6 or iPhone 6 Plus by simply tapping your phone. 

With the recent JP Morgan breach and Target hack that resulted in millions of stolen credit card numbers last year, you may be reluctant to use your phone as a payment method. Visa, however, assures that your information will remain safe thanks to the new Token Service it launched last month. 

So what does this mean for Apple Pay users? Basically, if you’re using a Visa credit card, your payment credentials won’t be used when you execute transactions. In fact, Visa says they won’t even be stored on your phone at all. 

Instead, the technology generates a specific digital account number that’s associated with your card. That means Apple Pay would never actually passes your 16-digit credit card number through to a merchant when you’re making a purchase with a Visa card. Rather, the digital account number is passed through to the merchant and then to Visa to charge your credit card.

This could prevent a hacker from intercepting your credit card number, since your credit card information isn’t actually being transferred. 

If an intruder happens to retrieve your token, he or she won’t be able to perform any purchases with your card, according to Visa. To complete a purchase, Apple Pay requires a few different authenticators, such as your Touch ID fingerprint and Apple ID among other things.

If your phone is lost or stolen, Apple will completely wipe the token. You wouldn’t even need to replace your credit card, Visa said. 

Visa’s Token Service isn’t just for Apple Pay — the company is making it available to all of its issuing financial institutions around the world starting with those in the US. But it’s worth noting that the service will work with Apple Pay when it launches. 

Apple says its payment platform will be launching in October, but has yet to specify a hard release date. Visa tells us it expects “merchants and banks” to make some announcements in the next few weeks, but didn’t specify what the announcements would entail and whether or not they would be related to Apple Pay.