Apple now wants to offer NFC to rival companies after all

Climbdown over NFC likely following pressure from European Commission

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Image: Getty via Dennis

The long-running dispute between the European Commission and Apple over the use of its payment technology could soon come to an end. The European Commission is confirming Apple’s plans to open up its Near Field Communication (NFC) technology to third party mobile wallet providers. Rumours of Apple’s proposal first surfaced in December 2023.

The Commission opened an investigation into Apple in 2020 for restricting rival mobile wallet developers’ access to the NFC chip on iPhones. In this way, Apple had a huge head start with Apple Pay.

Apple’s argument for keeping the technology closed was that it could negatively impact security.

So far, banks and services like PayPal have had a hard time getting around Apple Pay. Also, banks that support Apple Pay have to remit a small percentage to Apple per payment.

Now Apple has said it will no longer charge for using NFC or require businesses to use Apple Pay for payments. Apple also claims it will rely on an independent reviewer in cases where the company has denied NFC access. Apple’s commitments are for a 10-year period.

Opening up NFC technology would theoretically allow Google to make its own Wallet (now only available for Android) compatible with the iPhone, although that won’t happen anytime soon. Dutch banks like ING or ABN AMRO now use Apple Pay on a mandatory basis, but could soon offer payment services directly.

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