✳flâneur — a map of the web's best reading

Digital wallets and the “only Apple Pay does this” mythology

birchtree.me · 1,231 words · saved by 1 readers

Apple Pay is great, but I think there is some misunderstanding out there about the details of how it works. John Gruber has some choice words for Merrick Garland and crew, but this paragraph stood out as uniquely interesting to me: Payments you say? My specialty! First off, this obfuscation is referring to the DPAN, which is distinct from the FPAN. Ahem, sorry for the jargon, but it's important to understand what's happening, so let me explain. The FPAN is the “funding primary account number” and it’s the 15-18 digit number printed on your physical card. The DPAN is your “device primary account number”. Think of the DPAN as something like DNS records. When you type “birchtree.me” into your browser, your browser is able to determine what IP address this domain is related to and directs you there. I can keep my website physically in the same place on the same IP address, but I can change the domain to birchtree.com or wigglewobble.org and browsers will know what to do without the user ne

John Gruber has some choice words for Merrick Garland and crew, but this paragraph stood out as uniquely interesting to me: Apple Pay through Wallet obfuscates your actual credit card numbers, which retailers infamously use to track customers . It’s far more private than using your credit card itself. I highly doubt any banks or credit card issuers would do this themselves if given access to NFC tap-to-pay. Payments you say? My specialty! First off, this obfuscation is referring to the DPAN, which is distinct from the FPAN. Ahem, sorry for the jargon, but it's important to understand what's ha

Explore this link on the map →

related reading