Now that WWDC19 is over, here’s a look at the scorecard compared with the WWDC19 Apple Pay wish list. iOS 13 Core NFC gained Read/Write support for NDEF, FeliCa, MIFARE, ISO 7816 and ISO 15693. This means that iOS 13 apps can finally support contactless passports, drivers licenses, retail and manufacturer vicinity NFC tags, transit ticketing, badging, and much more. For developers this is a huge and welcome development.
The details are interesting. On the MIFARE side, Ultralight, Plus and DESFire are supported, the security weak Classic is not. FeliCa is there of course, but the weird thing is that all devices from iPhone 7 and above are supported. You might remember that from the Apple Pay point of view iPhone 7 is not a global FeliCa iPhone, but it is from a iOS 13 Core NFC point of view. I guess FeliCa support on all iPhone 7 models was really there all along, Apple just didn’t tell us…until now.
WWDC is all about developers so there was no marketing mention of the new iOS 13 Core NFC enabled NFC tag Apple Pay that Jennifer Bailey showed at Transact last month. It makes more sense to mention new services like that with new products at the fall event.
The Apple Card rollout due this summer is a head scratcher. There was nothing new for PassKit or Wallet at WWDC19, but there are lots of things Apple Card can do in Wallet that other cards, as yet, cannot do. It feels too big and important for just a press release and a new web page. And yet, by itself, it’s too small for a full blown Apple event. I think the Apple Card rollout is going to be a very interesting release for all things Apple Pay.
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