Visa says that by the end of the year its Visa Token Service will be in use in 12 European markets, and could be instrumental in securing IoT payments in the years to come.

The service supports digital payments by replacing cardholders’ account information with unique codes that are of no value to hackers. Having opened the service’s back-end to third party developers last autumn, the company is now celebrating its growth as more financial institutions and mobile payment platforms seek to leverage such security. It’s already active in 27 countries, including five in Europe, and Visa expects that latter number to reach at least 12 by the end of the year.

Meanwhile, the service could help to support digital payments through new avenues emerging with the Internet of Things, such as transactions conducted through smart cards or smartwatches. Visa has entered into a partnership with IBM to develop these kinds of use cases going forward with the aid of IBM’s Watson IoT platform.

Visa’s forecast was announced at the launch of its Innovation Center in London this week.