Mastercard on enabling Apple’s ‘digital first’ credit card

Ditch the plastic? Maybe, but not yet — and maybe not for a while.

The world knows by now that Apple has debuted its credit card — the Apple Card — in conjunction with Goldman Sachs and Mastercard. The card is available in both virtual and tangible, plastic forms.

The broad outline is one where the digital version of the card can be used wherever Apple Pay is accepted. The user signs up for the card with their iPhone in the Wallet App — the company said the applicant can get the card within minutes, which is issued straight to the phone.

There is also a physical, titanium card on offer, too, with a notable absence of information that has been a hallmark of plastic cards through the past several decades. That stands as a conscious uncoupling (to borrow a phrase from Gwyneth Paltrow) of personal details that, in the age of data breaches and compromises, may put users at ease when it comes to settling the bill in places where Apple Pay is still not yet an option.

 

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