It is worth noting that Amazon, apart from being a giant in the e-commerce space, is also one of the leaders in the technology sector as well and has been doing a lot of innovation in its customer experience technology. Earlier, Amazon introduced a technology to make payments using palm scanning which is even more convenient than fingerprint or any biometric. Now, the company says that it is bringing its palm-scanning technology to all of the Whole Foods stores located in the US.
Amazon said in a statement that the “reader would also be able to verify customers’ ages, allowing customers to use the device to purchase adult beverages — like beer at a sports event — just by hovering their palm over the reader. Coors Field was the initial adopter of this version of the system. It’s not clear if this part of the system will also work at Whole Foods or if customers will need to show their ID to store staff, as is common with most other self-checkouts”
Whole Foods Market CTO Leandro Balbinot said that “We are always looking for new ways to delight our customers and improve the shopping experience,” and added that “Since we’ve introduced Amazon One at Whole Foods Market stores over the past two years, we’ve seen that customers love the convenience it provides, and we’re excited to bring Amazon One to all of our customers across the U.S.”
Amazon claims that “customer information is secure in its own AWS Cloud, where it’s protected by multiple security controls. It notes it’s not actually using the palm image to identify the customer, but rather a palm “signature.” That’s determined by looking at the palm and underlying vein pattern to create a unique, numerical, vector representation for identity matching. Amazon also claimed earlier that it “does not use or sell customer information for advertising, marketing, or any other reasons.” The company further clarified its privacy policy by posting an FAQ saying that “Amazon One will never share palm data with third parties, under any circumstance, including in response to government demands, unless we’re required to comply with a legally valid and binding order.”
