Consumers in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates will soon be able to make contactless payments with their face at branches of Costa Coffee, drinks retailer MMI, grocery chain Géant, the Cove Beach at Caesars Palace beach club and the Coca-Cola Arena Dubai.

Consumers can sign up to the service by creating a cloud-based ‘digital key’ using a selfie and linking it to their chosen payment card, enabling them to authenticate contactless payments at participating merchants by looking into a camera.

The service is being rolled out using biometric payment technology provider PopID’s PopPay solution in partnership with Visa and investment company Dubai Holding.

“During the initial phase of the partnership, Dubai Holding will deploy PopPay at some of its assets across its leading destinations and attractions, which will be followed by the adoption of the payment technology across Dubai Holding’s wider ecosystem and through partners across CEE and MENA region,” the partners say.

“Under the alliance with Visa, issuing banks will be invited to join the platform and give their customers the ability to link their facial biometrics to their debit or credit cards to make payments; and acquiring banks will be offered the opportunity to distribute PopID’s proprietary face pay terminals to brick and mortar businesses.” 

The UAE announced plans to launch a biometric ‘face print’ system to access public and private sector services in October 2021.

Next: Get your free registration to Contactless World Congress, a new kind of event for a new kind of world.

Explore: Costa Coffee, Cove Beach at Caesars Palace, Dubai Holding, Géant, MMI, PopID, Visa

Learn more: Authentication, Biometrics, Cashless, Contactless, Dubai, Face recognition, Payments, PopPay, Retail

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