Sim Card

Make mobile banking secure with remote handset block, says minister

Paul Rasmussen — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 13:10:29 -0400

As Nokia confirms plans to enter the mobile banking market using technology it acquired with the recent purchase of Obopay, fears have arisen that stolen handsets could enable criminals to access users' bank accounts. In an attempt to reassure consumers, the UK government has issued guidelines detailing how the handset should be disabled when reported lost or stolen.

In association with the mobile payment industry, the government is calling for the SIM card to be blocked to stop mobile banking access, as well as immobilising the contactless payment function for transactions over €12. If a large number of smaller payments are noted in quick succession, these will also require verification, according to the guidelines.

"I am pleased that the mobile and banking industries have worked with us to ensure that the public is protected at the earliest opportunity," said Home Office Minister Alan Campbell. "We have already put in place measures to make it harder for thieves to profit from mobile phone theft - around 90 per cent of handsets reported stolen are now blocked within 24 hours of reporting, reducing their value and the incentive for criminals."

Campbell also called upon cell phone users to sign up to the National Mobile Phone register if they plan to use contactless payments. The register has been established to make it easier to identify when their handsets have fallen into the wrong hands and harder for criminals to abuse the phones' purchasing capabilities.

However, while this initiative might be laudable, making mobile banking or contactless payments more complicated or cumbersome for the consumer to use will dramatically lessen their appeal. But, given the glacial progress of mobile banking and contactless payments, these guidelines could be seen as antiquated when the mobile and financial institutions finally agree on workable partnerships.

For more on this story:
ITPro

Mystery surrounds Nokia handsets allegedly used for fraud

Paul Rasmussen — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 12:41:20 -0400

Reports that obsolete Nokia 1100 handsets are being sold for €25,000 to criminal gangs has promoted fears that they could be easily modified to hack into mobile banking services. One observer claims the antiquated phone can be cloned and used to intercept SMSs with individual bank codes, which are used in conjunction with stolen bank details to access accounts in Europe.

Ultrascan Research Services, a firm that gathers information on such subjects as online fraud, said police contacted the company about six months ago to see if they knew why the phones were in demand. Since then, Ultrascan has seen the price for the Nokia 1100 rise from around €5,000 to the latest figure.

However, to be of interest to the hackers, the Nokia 1100, which was originally sold for around €100 in 2003, has to have been made in Nokia's Bochum factory (which has since closed), and apparently contains software vulnerable to tampering.

According to Frank Engelsman of Ultrascan, it appeared a known Russian and Moroccan cybercrime gang, as well as other Romanian criminals, were trying to obtain the Nokia 1100 with the vulnerable software.

In an attempt to calm the situation, Nokia said it doesn't know of an 1100 software problem that would allow call spoofing. The company said a phone's SIM card has security mechanisms separate from the phone itself. "We have not identified any phone software problem that would allow the alleged use cases," said the company.

For more on this story:
ComputerWorld, Dialaphone and TechWorld

Operators in price war with SIM-only offers

Paul Rasmussen — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 04:41:49 -0500

European mobile operators are becoming embroiled in a price war over SIM-only offers, with an increasing number using this tactic as central to their marketing plans to attract new customers.

This battle, which focuses on offering the lowest price for airtime minutes and texts, is proving to be a double-edged sword for operators. On the plus side, SIM-only deals remove the high costs associated with handset subsidies, but consumers purchasing these deals have significantly lower average spends--at least 50 per cent in many cases, resulting in lower margins for the operator. O2 in the UK said its contract ARPU was down 2.5 per cent year-on-year in Q3/08, thought to have been caused by an increase in SIM-only tariffs.

Orange said its SIM-only deals were proving extremely popular with customers, and the company expected to launch further marketing innovations in this space over the next few months. "Interest in SIM-only offers has grown significantly--largely due to the value they provide--and they are attractive to customers who are not 'handset driven' and can benefit from cheaper tariffs."

Vodafone is also thought to be experiencing an upsurge in SIM-only deals as the market polarises between these cut-price offers and subscribers wanting the latest high-end smartphones. O2 has admitted SIM-only deals make up over 20 per cent of all contract connections, and is also seeing a similar divide to Vodafone between customers migrating towards the low-end or high-end of the handset market.

Separately, T-Mobile International has agreed a deal with the SIM card vendor Gemalto to develop prototypes of rich media applications based on Smart Card Web Server Technology (SCWS) in the SIM card. The idea is for Gemalto to provide T-Mobile with its Multimedia Ready SIM card incorporating SCWS technology, which enables applications to run directly from the SIM.

For more on this story:
Mobile Today and Cellular News

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Orange targets business users with SIM-only offer
T-Mobile goes aggressive--mimics winners' tactics
SIM marketing deal boosts O2 results
GSMA calls for full NFC functionality by mid-2009

Kick starting the LBS market

Paul Rasmussen — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 11:36:40 -0500

A decade ago location-based services (LBS) seem to tick all the boxes for mobile operators in terms of revenue generation but to date LBS has failed to deliver on its promise. Revenues from LBS are minute compared to other mobile services and growth is very slow. This might be set to change. According to SIM card vendor Sagem Orga the key stumbling block holding back LBS has been the lack of affordable and accurate positioning technology. Now Sagem Orga has joined forces with BlueSky Positioning to resolve this issue by integrating A-GPS positioning technology on to SIM cards for the first time. The two companies are planning to incorporate a GPS receiver and proprietary antenna into SIM cards enabling operators to deploy LBS applications without the need for software or hardware upgrades.

For more on this story go to Mobile Europe and Telecomredux

Related articles:
Forecast: 82M location-based mobile social networkers by 2013
Location-based services mean business--enterprise applications on the rise

T-Mobile goes aggressive--mimics winners' tactics

Paul Rasmussen — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 13:59:45 -0400

Having lagged behind the market for some years, T-Mobile UK has launched a price-cutting war offering to better any deal from rival mobile networks. The offensive, which the company hopes will see it lifted from fourth in the league table, mimics the highly successful SIM-only deals pioneered recently by O2 and Vodafone. T-Mobile's UK chief executive, Jim Hyde, claims that this new initiative will grab the attention of customers given that voice minutes remain the #1 issue. "The biggest application of mobile is still voice, and for those customers one of the biggest pain points is 'I signed up for a tariff last week and now I open up the newspaper and there's a better offer with more minutes for my money.'"

Whether this belated move by T-Mobile will lift the lacklustre image that presently surrounds the company is questionable. Network coverage is still perceived by many as poor and the company has failed to achieve a marketing success since it launched its Flext tariffs two years ago, which won customers from O2, Orange and Vodafone.

For more on this story:
- go to The Guardian and Pocket Review

Related stories:
T-Mobile cuts data roaming charges. Data roaming story
SIM marketing deal boosts O2 results. SIM card story