Apple Pay Launches in Israel
As reported by local outlet The Verifier, Apple Pay has officially launched in Israel following multiple reports suggesting an imminent launch sometime this year.
Ever since its launch in the United States in 2014, Apple Pay has slowly expanded to more countries worldwide while at the same time expanding the list of financial institutions that support the feature. With Apple Pay, users can easily add their credit or debit cards from supported banks to their iPhone and Apple Watch to make purchases at contactless payment terminals around the world. Apple Pay is also available on the Mac for web purchases.
At launch, there may be some banks that don't yet have support for Apple Pay; however, the list of supported banks will grow with time. Users can add a card to Apple Pay by heading over to the Wallet app on iPhone, pressing the plus button in the top-right hand corner, and following the on-screen prompts.
Related Stories
Apple Pay has launched for iPhone, Apple Watch, and Mac users in Qatar, expanding Apple's regional reach for its mobile payment solution, according to a post by the QNB Group (via AppleInsider).
Apple Pay in Qatar will first be available with the Dukhan Bank and QNB Group, which calls itself the "largest financial institution in the Middle East and Africa." Other banks in the country can be...
Apple is developing a new pay later service that will let customers pay for Apple Pay purchases in installments over time, reports Bloomberg. Installment payment options will be available for all Apple Pay purchases, with the feature not limited to Apple products.
The service is similar to Paypal's Buy Now, Pay Later feature, and internally, it's being called "Apple Pay Later."
Apple is...
iPhones.ru is reporting that iTunes and App Store purchases can no longer be made by Apple device users located in Russia, leaving them unable to pay for apps, media, or Apple services. According to the Russia-based site, it is now impossible for users to add funds to their App Store or iTunes Store accounts using regional bank cards issued by Russian banks including Alfa-Bank, Sber, and...
After several false dawns, Apple Pay looks finally ready to come to Israel early next month, based on local reports.
According to Hebrew-language site Calcalist, barring a last-minute change, Apple is expected to launch its digital payment system in the country in the first week of May.
Several previous reports over the last year have hinted at an imminent Apple Pay launch in Israel, but...
Stripe today announced a closed beta program for Apple's upcoming "Tap to Pay on iPhone" feature, with a sign-up form available on its website. The payment platform said the feature is "coming this spring" in the United States.
Tap to Pay on iPhone will allow newer iPhones to accept payments via Apple Pay, contactless credit and debit cards, and other digital wallets, with no additional...
Taiwan's Railways Administration (TRA) has officially announced support for using Apple Pay when purchasing train tickets with the service's e-booking mobile app.
In a press release on its website, the country's railway operator said it was making the new "Apple Pay ticketing service" available from September 7 in order to improve convenience for passengers when booking tickets via the...
Customers using cards with the Russian payment system "Mir" now have access to using their cards with Apple Pay, the Russian News Agency reports, citing a press release.
The Mir payment system is Russia's national payment system, with cards being accepted in 11 countries. The payment system has 270 banks as participants, with 150 banks issuing Mir cards. Apple Pay support came to Mir...
A number of banks are currently pressuring Visa to make changes to the way it processes some payments made via Apple Pay, moves that would reduce the fees the banks pay to Apple for certain transactions, reports The Wall Street Journal.
At the heart of the issue are automatic recurring payments like memberships and streaming services. Visa is aiming to change the way it issues tokens for...
Popular Stories
The redesigned MacBook Air with the all-new M2 Apple silicon chip will be available for customers starting Friday, July 15, MacRumors has learned from a retail source. The new MacBook Air was announced and previewed during WWDC earlier this month, with Apple stating availability will begin in July. The MacBook Air features a redesigned body that is thinner and lighter than the previous...
Apple today began selling refurbished Mac Studio models for the first time in the United States, Canada, and select European countries, such as Belgium, Germany, Ireland, Spain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom.
In the United States, two refurbished Mac Studio configurations are currently available, including one with the M1 Max chip (10-core CPU and 24-core GPU) for...
The M2 MacBook Pro has started making its way into customers' hands and we're learning more about how it performs in a variety of situations, but all eyes are really on the upcoming M2 MacBook Air which has seen a complete redesign and should be arriving in a couple of weeks.
Other top stories this week included a host of product rumors including additional M2 and even M3 Macs, an updated...
Fifteen years ago to this day, the iPhone, the revolutionary device presented to the world by the late Steve Jobs, officially went on sale.
The first iPhone was announced by Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, and went on sale on June 29, 2007. "An iPod, a phone, an internet mobile communicator... these are not three separate devices," Jobs famously said. "Today, Apple is going to reinvent the...
There appears to be a serious bug in macOS High Sierra that enables the root superuser on a Mac with a blank password and no security check. The bug, discovered by developer Lemi Ergin, lets anyone log into an admin account using the username "root" with no password. This works when attempting to access an administrator's account on an unlocked Mac, and it also provides access at the login...
Top Rated Comments
If you are a bank in Israel, it doesn't give you any competitive advantage to support Apple Pay. Until the first bank in the country adopts it. Then you are in danger of losing customers to that bank, so suddenly all the other banks are keen to support ApplePay as well. Apple has to convince ONE bank in a country.
Israel had two problems. One is standard for payments which was using a local design that was not supporting international contactless payment until last year (Apple Pay support only started last year in Israel when they finally officially supported EMV, not ever, don’t make stuff up), and second is the availability of contactless points in businesses which also only started to be common last year.
then they needed to support apple system which required the regulate body to approve which also took time because of the mess politically they are.
That also took until mid last year.
then, when all that hurdle was done, they were able to release support. The regulator said they can release support now, and they all worked to make it work at the same time.
israel banks and credit companies wanted to support it since 2017 but the regulator did not approve.
As I’ve learned overtime the greatest hurdle for apple pay is the archaic way of processing card payments in most countries: they have only one or two local companies that act as switches to process payments. Since they usually can’t handle the tokens generated by Apple Pay, that makes it impossible to implement apple pay with locally issued bank cards until Visa and Mastercard are allowed to operate as local switches too. That’s why Apple Pay took so long to arrive to countries in Eastern Europe, Latin America, Africa and, I bet, Israel too.