Google may soon be testing mobile-payment setups in the U.S.

Google may soon be testing mobile-payment setups in the U.S. Forgot your wallet, but need to pay for something? By this summer, that might not be a problem for some Americans shopping with their Google Android-powered smart phones. 

Google is reported to be readying tests in several U.S. cities of a mobile-payment system that uses so-called near-field communications, a high-frequency wireless technology that allows nearby objects to share data. The tests, reported to begin in New York, San Francisco and other U.S. cities in four months, will allow consumers to pay for items by simply waving their NFC-capable smart phones running Android version 2.3 at in-store NFC sales terminals from VeriFone Systems. 

Google and other companies said to be involved with the news declined to comment on the trials or provide further details-such as security-of the setup. However, many note that such wireless, contactless payment systems have been used by Japanese consumers for years. And banks and credit card companies in the U.S. have similar retail wave-and-pay systems, which use radio frequency ID schemes.