Māori use digital payments as much as other New Zealanders, and are slightly more open to AI shopping agents and facial recognition checkouts. That openness makes protecting Māori data urgent, before these technologies arrive.
These findings come from Payments NZ Consumer Research 2026, published in October 2026. It surveyed 1,000 New Zealanders in June 2026 and added a Māori booster sample, giving 214 Māori respondents.
Digital payments
- Smartphones: 27% of Māori and 25% nationally prefer to pay by smartphone for everyday purchases.
- Online banking: 62% of Māori make payments from an online account most weeks, compared with 46% nationally. The report says this gap matches earlier surveys.
- Online marketplaces: Māori use of sites such as Trade Me and Facebook Marketplace fell from 66% to 60% since 2024. Nationally it fell from 68% to 49%.
- Paying on marketplaces: 51% of Māori prefer cash on pickup, compared with 46% nationally.
Scams: Māori don’t blame the individual
Māori are as exposed to scams as everyone else, but are more likely to change how they pay and less likely to blame the victim.
| Fraud and scams | Māori | National |
|---|---|---|
| Concerned about fraud and scams when paying | 72% | 76% |
| Experienced a fraud or scam attempt in the last 12 months | 30% | 27% |
| Changed how they pay because of scams | 36% | 29% |
| Say the individual is most responsible for preventing scams | 28% | 38% |
| Say banks are most responsible | 21% | 26% |
| Say payment providers are most responsible | 16% | 12% |
| Say online platforms are most responsible | 10% | 7% |
| Say government and regulators are most responsible | 9% | 6% |
Payments NZ notes the drop in Māori placing responsibility on the individual. Māori spread responsibility more widely across the providers, platforms and regulators who build and run the system. That reflects a collective rather than individual view of responsibility for harm.
AI agents and facial recognition
Māori were slightly more open than the national sample to the payment ideas with the greatest data risks. Payments NZ did not mark these differences as notable, and describes the overall pattern as broadly similar.
| Find this payment idea appealing | Māori | National |
|---|---|---|
| Pay using a mobile number or other identifier instead of a bank account number | 56% | 49% |
| Check out using a QR code or facial recognition, without going through a checkout | 46% | 42% |
| Tell an AI agent to find, compare and buy products for me | 35% | 30% |
| 24/7 real-time payments | 72% | 77% |
On what matters most in a new way to pay, Māori and national rankings were close: safety and security came first for both (22% and 24%), followed by no extra fees (19% and 20%).
What this means for Māori
Payment data is Māori data. Where whānau shop, what they buy and how they pay builds a detailed picture of Māori lives. Facial recognition checkouts and AI agents that buy on our behalf would add biometric and behavioural data, much of it processed offshore. The Waitangi Tribunal’s WAI 2522 report recognised Crown obligations to actively protect Māori interests in data. Storing data in New Zealand is not the same as Māori control of it. Before these technologies arrive, Māori need a say in how that data is collected, held and used. The He Tangata, He Karetao, He Ātārangi framework is one way for whānau and organisations to test whether an AI system is safe to trust.
Payments NZ funded a Māori booster sample and reports Māori results across the whole survey. That is structural, not decorative. The next step is to act on the results by involving Māori in the design and governance of AI and biometric payment services before they are rolled out.
Disclaimer: Payments NZ cautions that the Māori sample is younger than the national sample, and that the research shows differences without explaining their causes. Percentages in this post are read from the report’s charts.
References
Payments NZ. (2026). Payments NZ consumer research 2026. https://www.paymentsnz.co.nz/resources/articles/consumer-research-2026/
Taiuru, K. (2026). He Tangata, He Karetao, He Ātārangi: Kaupapa Māori AI framework. Taiuru & Associates. https://www.taiuru.co.nz/kaupapa-maori-ai-framework/
Waitangi Tribunal. (2021). The report on the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (Wai 2522). Legislation Direct.
How to cite this page
Taiuru, K. (2026, November 2). Maori, Digital Payments and AI 2016. Taiuru & Associates Ltd. https://www.taiuru.co.nz/maori-digital-payments-and-ai/