Ant International, a global payments and fintech solutions provider, has completed an upgrade for Alipay+, its global wallet gateway solution, fully integrating privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs).
Alipay+ is now one of the pioneering digital payment systems to implement PETs in real-world operations. The move aims to provide increased data privacy assurance for the 1.8 billion e-wallet users connected through its network.
PETs are tools and techniques that allow data processing and analysis while maintaining the confidentiality of sensitive information. Following this upgrade, all data processed by Alipay+ is encrypted before any operations take place, ensuring it remains unidentifiable to Ant International throughout the entire payment process. Encrypted data is transferred for processing only, thereby minimizing risks associated with transmitting personal details across borders.
Close Collaboration and Open-Source Commitment
The upgrade involved working closely with Singapore’s Personal Data Protection Commission (PDPC). The PDPC evaluated a proof-of-concept for an AI prediction model training that utilized PETs, showing how Alipay+ and an e-wallet partner could jointly train the model without sharing or transferring raw customer data. The PDPC provided practical guidelines on data classification and handling in such scenarios, noting that secret shares generated via multi-party computation do not constitute personal data for receiving parties.
Additionally, Ant International has participated in IMDA’s PET Sandbox program and holds a Master Research Collaboration Agreement with NTU Singapore’s Digital Trust Centre to advance research on PETs for cross-border payments. The PETs codebase will be released over time to enable full visibility and control by partners. Alipay+ is encouraging its partners to collaborate with Ant International to incorporate PETs into their operations.
Commenting on the upgrade, Jiang-Ming Yang, Chief Innovation Officer of Ant International, stated that it offers both partners and customers assurance that their data remains private throughout the payment process, even from Ant International itself.
