Jim Skamarakas

So this is still going on around the web blogs, journalists and other forums of speculation. From the June 21, 2005 article at eWeek with Googe CEO Eric Schmidt (Click here to read the full article) to people dumpster diving through http://googlepress.blogspot.com/ and job postings at Google. GoogleRumors, a Web log (blog), recently reported that a computer file Google uses to scour the Internet to stock its Web site database now has a “purchases” category.

And then a quick search finds several watching Google blogs discussing a discovered Google “Purchases” registration page, which asks for credit card information.

Rumors of a Google online payment system date back to at least June, when Scot Wingo, chief executive officer of Web commerce consultant ChannelAdvisor, said Google had asked some of his clients to use just such a system. Since then, the rumors have only grown stronger and increased in number.

As for dumpster diving, people point to the Sept. 6, 2005 discovery of a job listing for a Google “fraud operations director, merchant payment solutions.” Back in June, at the peak of the last Google Wallet rumor cycle, Google confirmed it was planning to expand into broader online payment services to handle payments from advertisers and to Web publishers in Google’s popular online advertising programs, but gave no additional details.

Google Wallet, should it indeed be real will draw attention from, and put the pressure to compete with Internet bastions San Jose, Calif.-based PayPal, whose electronic payment system is an Internet staple, and eBay, PayPal’s owner.

One of those analysts, Forrester Research analyst Charlene Li, “muses” on her blog that Google could capitalize on its existing ties to thousands of businesses, which already advertise on Google Web pages.

“eBay flew under Google’s radar long enough,” writes Om Malik, a senior writer for Business 2.0 magazine.

Can Google suceed where competitor Yahoo failed it it’s attempt at an online payment system: started in 2000 Yahoo created PayDirect only to shut it down earlier this year.

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