Dear readsfolk,
PayPal, the e-commerce division of eBay, is opening up to developers on November 3rd. I happened to chance across a cool video of the announcement on TechCrunch…
Opening up to developers do mean a lot of possibilities. Like TechCrunch comments, the scenes shown in the video may not happen in the near future, but it is definitely a start, and we can look forward to it.
I would definitely love to see a time when I could walk into a shop and pay using my PayPal id. Now that would truly be cashless shopping! And of course, it does increase physical security – you can walk around with no money, or credit cards…
Throwing it open for developers could see fantastic ideas being visualised. It might be the first time that such a big ecommerce venture is opening up, and it does take the idea of developing way beyond iPhone apps.
However, it does throw open a lot of security related questions, especially since we are talking about the most sensitive sector here – banking. For example, if PayPal is serious about the fingerprint scanning shown in the video, either they will have to develop an entirely new system of authentication and encryption, or they will have to form an addon system, which will supply the username and password to the existing system on verification of the fingerprint. But then, another level of system adds on to security risks, and if this system is hosted by somebody else (which would probably be, in the case of developers) then how safe is our authentication details? And therefore, our money?
These are challenges which PayPal will have to address, but I’m hoping that they will! Lets see, and hope for a PayPal future 
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