Resistance to facial recognition payment in China: The influence of privacy-related factors

Abstract

As mobile payment technology is at a nascent stage, the use of facial recognition payment (FRP) services is gradually penetrating the lives of Chinese people. Although the FRP system may have advantages over other payment technologies, a civil lawsuit over refusing to submit facial information and a series of illegal activities related to selling facial information have raised the public's privacy concerns, which might further engender Chinese users' resistance towards FRP. Based on privacy calculus theory and innovation resistance theory, this study builds a research model of FRP and examines it by using a cross-sectional study with 1200 Chinese users. The findings demonstrate that the perceived effectiveness of privacy policy has significant relationships with privacy control, perceived privacy risk, perceived benefits, and resistance. Both privacy control and perceived privacy risk are significantly related to privacy concerns. There is also a significant relationship between the perceived privacy risk and resistance to FRP. Meanwhile, privacy concerns positively affect user resistance, while perceived benefits negatively affect user resistance. In contrast to previous research, the perceived privacy risk has a positive impact on the perceived benefits. This study offers cutting-edge contributions to both academia and industry.