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The new technology will interact with near-field communication-equipped cash registers, in effect turning the devices into virtual wallets, Bloomberg
Google has been talking about adding NFC-enabled payments since at least November 2010, when then-CEO Eric Schmidt disclosed that Samsung’s Nexus S mobile device contained an NFC chip. That device became available last December.
In March, Bloomberg reported that thousands of stores in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington, D.C., would soon begin testing Google’s NFC payment system. If Google begins enabling mobile payments this week, it will give Android a jump over Apple, which has reportedly decided not to include NFC in its iPhone 5 release.