It appears that a brand new update for the T-Mobile Galaxy S II subtly includes an “ISIS/NFC update.” If this update enables the ISIS service on the phone, it would make the Galaxy S II the first phone to utilize the Google-Wallet mobile payments competitor.
ISIS, if you happen to have forgotten, (no one would blame you, it was announced all the way back in 2010) is an NFC-based mobile wallet system backed by AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon.
Now it seems like things are finally coming to a head — Bloomberg reports that the ISIS payments system is expected to go live sometime next month, so expect more similar updates to roll out to other NFC-enabled devices sooner rather than later. In addition to support for the multi-carrier payments scheme, the update brings Galaxy S II owners nearly up to speed with access to Android 4.0.3 and includes a handful of bug fixes to boot. We’ve reached out to T-Mobile for some further clarification, but for now that’s about all we know.
Update: T-Mobile has responded with the following:
We have nothing to share at this time regarding Isis compatible products from T-Mobile, and we have nothing to add regarding the software update.
So that helps.
If you have a T-Mobile Galaxy S II, the update instructions can be found here. Oh, and feel free to let us know how it works.
[via Android Police]
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