Google Android fans and promoters continue to call the Android operating system “open” in contrast to Apple’s iOS.

But how open is this?

Google Inc. says Verizon Wireless is keeping it from building its new mobile payments application into a new line of smartphones powered by the search giant’s Android operating system.

Verizon, which is pushing a competing mobile payments platform, will begin selling the Galaxy Nexus this month. But the smartphone, developed by Google and Samsung Electronics Co., but it won’t include the Google Wallet, a payment and rewards app that is key to Google’s attempt to tap the local-business advertising market.

And, while we are on the topic of Android, some of its openness leads inexorably to huge security risks.

Related articles

• Verizon blocks Google Wallet from first phone to run new version of Android (mercurynews.com)
• Verizon Wireless nixes Google Wallet in new phone (usatoday.com)