TLDR
- Mastercard has launched its Crypto Credential pilot program, enabling users to send and receive crypto using simplified aliases instead of complex blockchain addresses.
- The pilot is live on Bit2Me, Lirium, and Mercado Bitcoin exchanges, allowing users in 13 countries across Latin America and Europe to conduct cross-border and domestic transfers across multiple currencies and blockchains.
- Mastercard Crypto Credential verifies interactions between consumers and businesses on blockchain networks, ensuring that users meet verification standards and that recipient wallets support the transferred assets.
- The program supports the exchange of Travel Rule information for cross-border transactions, ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements designed to prevent illegal and illicit activities.
- While the current focus is on P2P transactions, Mastercard sees potential for Crypto Credential to support various use cases, including NFTs, ticketing, and other payment solutions
Mastercard has announced the launch of its Crypto Credential pilot program.
The global payment processing giant has partnered with several crypto exchanges, including Bit2Me, Lirium, and Mercado Bitcoin, to enable users to send and receive crypto using simplified aliases instead of the often lengthy and complex blockchain addresses.
The pilot program is now live, allowing users in 13 countries across Latin America and Europe, including Argentina, Brazil, Chile, France, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, and Uruguay, to conduct cross-border and domestic transfers across multiple currencies and blockchains.
This marks the first real-world application of Mastercard’s Crypto Credential technology, which was unveiled at Consensus in 2023.
Mastercard’s Crypto Credential serves as a verification tool for interactions between consumers and businesses on blockchain networks.
By ensuring that users meet a set of verification standards and confirming that the recipient’s wallet supports the transferred asset, the program aims to build trust and certainty in these transactions.
The exchange of metadata eliminates the complexity of determining which assets or chains are supported by the recipient, streamlining the process and reducing the risk of lost funds.
The process involves exchanges first verifying users under Mastercard Crypto Credential standards, granting them an alias for sending and receiving funds across all supported exchanges.
When initiating a transfer, Crypto Credential verifies the validity of the recipient’s alias and confirms that their wallet supports the digital asset and associated blockchain.
If the receiving wallet is incompatible, the sender is notified, and the transaction is halted, protecting all parties from potential losses.
In addition to streamlining the transaction process, Mastercard Crypto Credential supports the exchange of Travel Rule information for cross-border transactions, ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements designed to prevent illegal and illicit activities. This feature is crucial in building confidence among users and regulators alike.
While the current focus is on P2P transactions, Mastercard sees potential for its Crypto Credential to support a wide range of use cases, including NFTs, ticketing, and other payment solutions, depending on market demands and compliance requirements.
Industry experts have praised the initiative, with Walter Pimenta, executive vice president of Product and Engineering for Latin America and the Caribbean at Mastercard, emphasizing the company’s dedication to bringing safe, simple, and secure payments to the forefront.
Partners such as Bit2Me, Foxbit Group, Lirium, and Mercado Bitcoin have expressed their enthusiasm for collaborating with Mastercard to drive payment alternatives and enhance the user experience in the dynamic world of cryptocurrencies.
As the pilot program rolls out, a select group of crypto wallet users will leverage Mastercard Crypto Credential on a first-come, first-serve basis, with wider availability expected to extend to more than 7 million users across the participating exchanges over the coming months.
