PCI Pal Glossary

Digital Wallets

Digital wallets are electronic applications that securely store payment card information, bank account details, and other payment credentials on mobile devices or in the cloud, enabling users to make purchases without physical cards. Popular digital wallets include Apple Pay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay, and PayPal, which use tokenization to replace actual card numbers with unique digital tokens for each transaction.

Digital wallets enhance security through biometric authentication, reduce fraud risk, and offer convenient contactless payments both online and in physical stores. For merchants, accepting digital wallet payments can improve checkout conversion rates, reduce PCI DSS compliance scope since card data never touches merchant systems, and provide customers with their preferred modern payment methods.

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See also:

• Payment Service Provider
• Strong Customer Authentication
• Automated Payments