Nokia takes NFC phones to New York subway Despite eschewing NFC payments in the rest of the world, Nokia will be testing a handset capable of paying for subway tickets in New York, and before the end of 2011. The news came as a footnote to Wednesday's releases, and simply stated that the Finnish company so publicly embracing Microsoft is also working with the New York …
It's a dig at the US tech media. NFC public transport trials have being going on for years without reports in the gadget pages, and this is just one more. The only "big" news is that it's in the USA. Yes, MTA is one of the largest transport authorities in the world, but this doesn't mean they're going to trialling NFC on their entire network.
Incidentally, the trial hardware is the Nokia 603, which isn't on general sale in the USA at all:
"Secure NFC payments will arrive on Symbian NFC phones for the first time at the beginning of 2012 [...] As a first step, an NFC card emulation update will be sent out to the Nokia 603 — launched earlier this month — enabling the handset to be used for mobile payments using NFC SIM cards." [ source: http://www.nfcworld.com/2011/10/26/310937/nokia-to-bring-nfc-to-new-york-commuters/ ]
"There is also the C7, branded Astound in the USA, but that lacks an embedded secure element, and even appears to lack support for the Single Wire Protocol "
C7 has no embedded secure element, but can access an external secure element. Given that Nokia have said that C7 is payment capable*, and that this feature will be rolled out in 2012, I'd guess that the hardware for Single Wire Protocol is present, but the software is missing, pending finalisation of the SWP spec.
*source: http://www.nfcworld.com/2011/08/29/39462/nokia-symbian-nfc-phones-to-support-mobile-payments-in-2012/ ("[...] The upgrade will also be available to users of the Nokia C7, a spokesman confirmed.")
So in essence Nokia's last year's offering are more capable then these allnew sing-and-dance WP7 models. Even their doomed N9 is a more capable smartphone.
Great. I though newer was supposed to be 'better'. But it seems that these Lumia phones are severely compromised. Sure, you get a faster cpu but they ditched the front facing camera, clipped NFC because their premier partner doesn't deliver until maybe next year (hmmm... were have I heard that one before...), smaller screen.
It's a CLEAR sign that Nokia is in bed with the wrong partner. But I guess Nokia's shareholders care more about their big bonusses from Steve Balmer next year then providing the world with an increasingly better product-line (and hence earn money the way it should).
It does show how strong Microsoft's grip is on this market. If Nokia purposely holds back NFC until their partner is 'ready'. Coupled with Microsoft Tax on Android handset-makers. This is definitly not good for consumers as devices become more bling and less substance.
Why they don't receive the cc information from the NFC and store it and then submit batches to the CC house for processing?
We're talking about low risk transactions so that you're causing the queue to wait on CC processing in real time. They just have to wait until the CC details are captured and verified.
There are also some Fraud detection that could also be put in to place to reduce their risk.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
