New technology allows BlackBerry phones to double up as credit cards

BlackBerry users will soon be able to charge purchases at the cash register to their Visa cards using technology incorporated in the company's new smartphone models.

Research In Motion says that Visa had given the go ahead for its credit card system to work using the smartphone maker's encrypted mobile payment technology. The technology allows secure linkage of BlackBerrys to bank accounts and credit cards.

 The announcement makes RIM an early mover in the growing market for mobile payments, which was still in its infancy.

RIM's payment technology allows customers to use their smartphones like bank cards, for making payments for items by holding the phones up to a sales terminal for the transaction to be processed.

The phone would incorporate a feature that would make it identical to chips implanted in credit cards.

According to Geoffrey MacGillivray, manager of services security and payments at RIM, any place which could be tapped with a credit card could now tap mobile phones.