A Possible New Competitor in the Mobile Payment realm

Well, there is yet another player in the mobile payment realm. Enter a service called CurrentC. The premise of CurrentC is to allow retailers to avoid paying credit card fees, according to this article on TechCrunch. When someone wants to buy something, all they have to do is open the Current C app on their smart phone and scan the QR code on the terminal. Despite this convenience for retailers, there are major privacy and security issues. How is the data that the service collects going to be stored, and who will have access to it? Like credit card companies, Current C will collect health data and other information based on what people are buying. While there are specific firms that can match online and offline data, matching tracked purchases with online profile information, no one is sure who will be tracking the data from Current C or what its uses will be. Will this new service become a serious competitor with Apple Pay? Will retailers that already support Apple Pay switch to Current C to avoid paying credit card fees? Only time will tell.