Amazon One and Whole Foods to Usher in the Next Stage of Biometric Payments

If you know what's good for you, you'll keep your hands to yourself

I’d argue this whole thing started in the late ‘00s and early ‘10s with the introduction of self-checkout. I remember encountering it at the local grocery store in Seattle and being appalled at how many people flocked to scan their own groceries.

Was it really that awful to have another person scan and bag your groceries for you? And if it was and we were really going to go full steam ahead with this shopping concept, what were we going to get out of it? After all, these stores weren’t going to have to pay as many staff members to man the checkout stations. So, would the savings get passed down to shoppers in the form of cheaper goods? Of course not.

Consumers never get anything out of these upgraded experiences. Except to be conditioned to crave more and more convenience. If it’s not fast and easy, consumers don’t want it.

The hi-tech consumer conditioning didn’t stop there.

Then came the changes to our smartphones.

First, they gave us the ability to add a lock screen. There’s nothing odd about unlocking a piece of hardware or software with a passcode. However, it paved the way for the biometric authentication options that followed.

You could push your finger against the button at the bottom of your smartphone to unlock it.

And let’s be honest, we touch our phones frequently throughout the day. Even if we never surrendered an official thumb or fingerprint, the phone manufacturer could eventually piece it all together.

Next came facial recognition. Simply smile for that camera that’s always watching you and let it use your face to open up your phone.

Once we got used to unlocking our phones with our biometrics, we had the option of turning our smartphones into digital wallets.

Activate Google or Apple Pay functionality, add your banking or credit card details, and then tap your phone on any card reader device to make your payment at the store, restaurant, gas station, etc.

What bothered me about this was that tap-to-pay functionality already existed on our credit cards. So unless people were desperate to save those few seconds it took to pull their wallets and cards out, I can’t imagine what would compel them to touch their phones — containing all kinds of highly sensitive info, photos, and communications on them — to a payment processor.

Regardless, this technological transition got people used to sticking out their phones. To people whose smartphones had come to feel like an extension of their hands, this was a natural next step.

How Amazon One Palm Scanners Work

The next technological innovation was introduced in 2021 to select Amazon and Whole Foods stores. It’s called “Just Walk Out” shopping.

Here’s how it works:

Customer enters the store. They must decide then and there if they want to do Just Walk Out shopping or regular shopping.

To do JWO, they have three options:

1. Scan the QR code in their Amazon or Whole Foods app.

2. Scan their palm on the Amazon One scanner.

3. Insert a credit card that’s associated with their Amazon profile.

They’re then surveilled throughout the store as they put items into their cart.

Supermarket News explains here:

“Allowing customers to skip the checkout line, Just Walk Out uses overhead computer-vision cameras, weight sensors and deep-learning technology to detect merchandise that shoppers take from or return to shelves and track items selected in a virtual cart.”

They’re then free to exit the store whenever they’re done. No checkout needed.

As of right now, there’s no massive rollout of Just Walk Out technology. I suspect that’s because people aren’t quite ready for that level of biometric surveillance. However, it appears that Amazon’s data is telling them that the public is ready for one part of the experience — palm scanning payments.

Palm Scanning Payments Coming to a Store Near You

By the end of 2023, the Amazon One biometric scanning devices are being rolled out to all Whole Foods locations across the U.S.

Considering what I witnessed at the Disney Parks last year, I’m not surprised that Amazon is ready to make a massive investment in biometric scanners. I watched as everyone mindlessly stuck their fingers in the scanner, not asking a single question about it. And why should they? They had rides to go on and junk food to eat! To hell with protecting their biometric data.

At the bottom of that post I wrote, someone had suggested that we don’t need to be worried about what Disney was going to do with our fingerprints. Let me reiterate my concerns within the context of Amazon having your palmprint:

For starters, you need to be an Amazon member in order to use the palm scanners at Whole Foods. That’s not gonna be a problem for most people since everyone loves super cheap, low quality shit delivered within two days.

This Forbes article explains how the biometric payment processing technology works:

“By reading the ridges and lines in customers’ palms and vein structures, Amazon One creates a unique representation known as a palm signature, which Amazon assures cannot be replicated or stolen like a credit card, phone or cash.”

Some of you might be thinking this all sounds well and good. After all, it’s not like anyone enjoys being out in the real world or having to interact with their fellow human anymore right. Let’s just get you in and out of that grocery store. Who cares if it means Big Business and Big Tech have your palmprint and all the financial transactions attached to it?

Plus, as Amazon has assured us, your data is perfectly safe. Much safer than those awful credit cards or *gasp* dollar bills you would otherwise pay with.

“Data stored on Amazon One is also protected by ‘multiple security controls and has tamper-detection capabilities,’ and stores data on security program AWS Cloud, though its security has been called into question through its use of cloud-base storage.”

Of course, you shouldn’t pay attention to the man behind the curtain. He’s got everything running smoothly and would never ever ever allow anything bad to happen to your data — financial or biometric.

It’s not like Amazon has a long history of data breaches. And it’s not like the AWS data servers go down often, rendering anyone trying to run software services, websites, or even payment processing through them unable to do so.

Oh, and don’t worry about the government encroaching. Your Amazon biometric data and purchasing habits are totally safe from government eyes. Amazon wouldn’t betray your trust and hand over your data to… Ummm… Hold on a second…

• Amazon turns over record amount of customer data to US law enforcement (2018)

• Amazon says US government demands for customer data went up (2019)

• Amazon says government demands for user data spiked by 800% in 2020 (2020)

• Amazon says governments requested record amount of user data last year (2021)

Nope. Nothing to see here, folks.

Final Thoughts

Do you see what’s going on here? The evolution of biometrics is taking us straight into the arms of microchip implants.

First, they got us used to holding out our phones to purchase something. Now, they’re getting us used to inserting our fingers and holding out our palms to transact with one another.

The next step is going to be facial recognition software in stores (i.e. Just Walk Out) so that we can bypass any and all interactions with other people. They taught us to avoid the checkout lanes with self-checkout, so this is simply bringing us full circle.

And for those who don’t want to be surveilled, that’s cool. The chip implant will give them the option to stick their arm out in order to pay — a movement that will already feel natural to them.

No one’s going to need to carry around a pesky smartphone or Magic Band when they can just get them to put the technology under their skin.

Peter Wittgenstein

Peter Wittgenstein on Instagram: “They give you a cookie afterwards...”

July 15, 2023

I can’t tell anyone how to live their lives. But I feel like we’ve reached a point where lots of people need someone to shake them out of their slumber. And, if need be, to scream “WAKE THE FUCK UP!” in their faces. Because this shit is scary.

The next time you think about holding out your phone, your palm, or whatever personal object or body part it is that a business or the government wants from you, stop and ask yourself:

“Is the convenience worth whatever I’m handing over to them?”

20 years ago we lived just fine without all this technology. And we will be okay if we stop allowing it — and the people who own it and the data we pump into it — to control so much of our lives, our movements, our decisions, etc.

It’s time to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. To embrace a life with less technology. To stop giving more and more of our literal selves and bodies over to the people who hate us and want to control us.

In other words, don’t stick your fucking palm into that Whole Foods scanner.