Apple restores card payments for Indian digital purchases

Apple has begun restoring credit and debit card payments for digital purchases in India, ending a suspension that lasted more than four years. The phased rollout, which started recently, will allow eligible users to once again use Visa and Mastercard cards to pay for iCloud storage, Apple Music, App Store apps, and other subscriptions directly from their Apple Accounts.

The company suspended card payments in India in May 2022 following the Reserve Bank of India's implementation of a new framework for recurring transactions. The regulations introduced stricter authentication requirements and mandated the use of card tokenization, a system that replaces actual card numbers with unique encrypted tokens to enhance security. The rules also prevented merchants from storing customers' card details. While Apple worked to update its systems for compliance, Indian users had to rely on alternative payment methods such as the Unified Payments Interface (UPI), net banking, and manually topping up their Apple Account balances.

Industry analysts noted that the lack of direct card payments created friction, particularly for automatic subscription renewals, which sometimes failed. Tarun Pathak,...