Contactless technology was developed by Mastercard with the mindset of never sacrificing security for convenience. Contactless payment systems may be for credit cards, debit cards, smart cards, or other devices, including smartphones and other mobile devices, that use radio-frequency identification (RFID) or near field communication (NFC, e.g. Samsung Pay, Apple Pay, Google Pay, Fitbit Pay, Merpay or any bank mobile application that support contactless) for making secure payments.

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The embedded chip and antenna enable consumers to wave their card, fob, or handheld device over a reader at the point of sale terminal.

Contactless payments are made in close physical proximity, unlike mobile payments which use broad-area cellular or WiFi networks and do not involve close physical proximity.

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Recently introduced in Oman, contactless cards raise a few concerns about how secure it is for a regular users. In this piece, we talk to experts from Banks across Oman to review how safe they are to use: