Three quarters of British consumers aged 16 to 24 (76%) say they would feel comfortable using biometric security when making a payment, with more than half keen to see facial recognition, fingerprints and retina scans replace passwords and PIN codes altogether.

The Visa Europe survey also found 69% believe biometrics will make their lives “faster and easier”.

Fingerprint scanning (70%) is the most popular option among these “Generation Z” consumers followed by retina scans (39%), facial recognition (27%), implanted chips (16%), DNA samples (15%) and voice recognition (12%).

“We have more logins and passwords than ever to help keep us secure online and on the high street, but for Gen Z it just feels like an unnecessary burden,” says Jonathan Vaux, executive director at Visa Europe.

“Biometric authentication using fingerprint recognition or retinal scans offers an ideal solution, combining unique security and ease of use. As products come online, with these features integrated, we expect to see multiple passwords as the industry standard begin to decline. For banks and product providers, this means two challenges.

“First, to continue and quicken the pace of development on biometrics to answer this demand from Generation Z. Second, to continue to evaluate the increasing range of authentication options to ensure customer convenience and security as payment increasingly becomes embedded into a range of applications.”