Mobile technology has really changed the way people live their daily lives affecting everything from how we schedule and plan to how we interact even with our own immediate families. Indeed, it was not that long ago that the idea of banking from your phone—or even your home computer—was a sensitive one.
But mobile technology has come a long way, particularly with the advancement of the smartphone. These miniature computers are now so commonplace—and so secure—that we probably couldn’t conduct most of our day without them.
Mobile devices have even influenced how we think about banking; not only in terms of our ability to access account information quickly and from anywhere, but even in terms of how we feel about security. For example, Chase has allowed mobile users to view account balances without having to enter a password since late 2014.
However, smartphones can now use fingerprint authentication to ensure the identity of the user, something that has become the newest feature in mobile banking.
On the heels of Bank of America adding such a feature to their mobile app (for Samsung users), Chase bank has also now done the same. With Android’s most recent Marshmallow software update, released on Monday, the Chase Mobile application added support for fingerprint verification, which uses the device’s camera as a kind of fingerprint scanner. Chase had already added this feature, too, in a June 2015 iOS update for the Apple iPhone, via Apple’s TouchID software. This update also expanded the availability of the Bank of America fingerprint verification to other Android devices (and not just Samsung).
Chase bank has an active mobile user base of approximately 23 million (in 2015), which is a 20 percent increase from the previous year.
Perhaps now, then, Chase will also make the move to be included on the Android Pay program. While the bank has long been a supporter of Google Wallet, it appears they have not been as quick to adopt the contactless payment form as competitors like Capital One, American Express, and Bank of America.
