Visa: 'Generation Z' wants biometric security, not passwords.

A large majority of young British adults are ready to adopt biometric security for payments, according to a new survey commissioned by Visa Europe.

In the survey of 2,000 respondents, 76% of 16- to 24-year-olds said they were comfortable making  payments using biometric security such as fingerprint, iris or facial recognition.

In addition, 69% believed the transition would make their lives faster and easier.  

Fingerprint emerged as the favoured modality, with 70 per cent predicting that this will be the primary form of identification by 2020.

Retina scans came a distant second at 39pc, followed by facial recognition at 27%. Lower down the list was voice recognition at 12pc, implanted chips at 16pc and rapid DNA samples at 15%.

“We have more logins and passwords than ever to help keep us secure online and on the high street, but for Gen Z it just feels like an unnecessary burden," Jonathan Vaux, Executive Director at Visa Europe, told The Daily Telegraph.

"Biometric authentication using fingerprint recognition or retinal scans offers an ideal solution, combining unique security and ease of use. As products come online with these features integrated, we expect to see multiple passwords as the industry standard begin to decline."