I've actually worked in smartcard issuance at some point and tap to pay isn't at all more secure than the cards with smartchips requiring physical contact and a pin code that the banks had finally gotten around to adopt after more than a decade of Visa and Mastercard trying to force them to ditch magstrip (which was laughably insecure).

Tap to pay actuall reduced security because it removed the "locked for anything with a key known only to the user" element and replaced it with a limit on losses (i.e. pinless payments are limited to a certain amount so losses if the card is stolen are limited) and replaced the physical connection requirement with a radio-range one which can be worked around with a directional antenna (something as simple as a pringles can).

Sure, it's better than magstrip, but then pretty much anything is better than magstrip.