Selfies have been around for what seems like a few decades at least, though the term selfie was only coined in the last decade. Once upon a time selfies were only really popular amongst the younger generation but you’re guaranteed to find someone’s grandparents taking a cute selfie together under the gaze of the Burj Khalifa. And while selfies are great, they’re also incredibly annoying at times. Yes, I’m speaking of those selfie takers who stop dead in their track on a bustling path just to take a selfie, oblivious of my eyes boring into the backs of their heads as I try to discern their IQ levels.
However, selfies may have some use now.
Thanks to a generous donation (read $100,000) by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Khalifa University professor Dr. Ernesto Damiani has created a technology that allows people to pay for items by taking selfies. The “Pay with a Selfie” project is aimed at helping those without access to debit and credit machines, ATMs and banks.
“Everybody has a smartphone, even in rural or developing areas where there is not much technology and everyone takes selfies, so the ability to use these pictures and combine them with a form of encryption that is unforgeable, and use this as a method of payment, will certainly change how transactions are made in developing countries. And it may aid in the transition from bartering systems to monetary systems that will, in turn, spur the growth of the economy.”
– Dr Damiani, of the Khalifa University’s department of electrical and computer engineering.
However before you get your pitchforks out and protest that this is just objectifying a person’s looks; your neighbour’s selfie might be worth more than his neighbour’s, the system doesn’t value your selfie but rather uses it as a form of verification.
The system requires the customer and seller to take pictures of each other and details of the purchase, such as holding up a price tag in the photo, and send it to a third party who will verify the images and process the payment.
Using encryption software, the point-of-service will reconstruct the images of the buyer, seller and the amount to validate the payment before the transaction is complete.
Source: The National
