All 500-plus Whole Foods stores will soon let you pay with a palm scan


Amazon is bringing its palm-scanning technology to even more Whole Foods stores. By the end of this year, Amazon says you’ll be able to pay for your purchase using just the palm of your hand at the over 500 Whole Foods locations it has throughout the US.
The palm-scanning tech is part of Amazon One, a service that lets you link your Amazon account and payment information to your palm print. Once your palm print is in Amazon’s system, you can hover your palm over an Amazon One scanner, and it will charge the payment method that’s tied to your Amazon account.
Amazon One isn’t just a contactless payment method, however — it’s also an identification service. The company has deployed the technology in sports stadiums, raceways, and casinos, enabling venues to use palm scans as a way to verify guests’ ages when purchasing age-restricted items, like alcohol.
Although Amazon says palm scanning is “considered more private” than other forms of biometric identification, it has still raised some concerns. For one, Amazon will store your palm signature — which Amazon uses the unique ridges and lines throughout your palm to create — in the cloud instead of locally on a device like Apple’s Face ID technology does. As my colleague James Vincent notes, that’s kind of a big tradeoff just to get a more convenient way to shop or verify your age.
Last year, Colorado’s Red Rocks Amphitheater stopped using Amazon One tech after advocates and artists expressed concerns about data collection and surveillance. It also doesn’t help that Amazon has received scrutiny over its handling of user data in the past. The company is currently facing a class action lawsuit that accuses its Amazon Go stores of tracking New York customers’ body shapes, sizes, and palm prints without their knowledge.
Amazon is bringing its palm-scanning technology to even more Whole Foods stores. By the end of this year, Amazon says you’ll be able to pay for your purchase using just the palm of your hand at the over 500 Whole Foods locations it has throughout the US. The palm-scanning tech…
Recent Posts
- Fraudsters seem to target Seagate hard drives in order to pass old, used HDDs as new ones using intricate techniques
- Hackers steal over $1bn in one of the biggest crypto thefts ever
- Annapurna’s 2025 lineup of indie games is full of tea and T-poses
- Google Drive gets searchable video transcripts
- Andor is on the offensive in latest season 2 trailer
Archives
- February 2025
- January 2025
- December 2024
- November 2024
- October 2024
- September 2024
- August 2024
- July 2024
- June 2024
- May 2024
- April 2024
- March 2024
- February 2024
- January 2024
- December 2023
- November 2023
- October 2023
- September 2023
- August 2023
- July 2023
- June 2023
- May 2023
- April 2023
- March 2023
- February 2023
- January 2023
- December 2022
- November 2022
- October 2022
- September 2022
- August 2022
- July 2022
- June 2022
- May 2022
- April 2022
- March 2022
- February 2022
- January 2022
- December 2021
- November 2021
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- July 2021
- June 2021
- May 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- November 2020
- October 2020
- September 2020
- August 2020
- July 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- September 2018
- October 2017
- December 2011
- August 2010