Mobile wallet offered to shoppers

19 May 2011 Last updated at 20:47 ET <!-- Embedding the video player --> <!-- This is the embedded player component -->

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The first service that allows users to pay for purchases via their mobile phone has been launched in the UK.

Among shops signed up to the system are McDonalds, EAT, Pret-a-Manger and some Boots stores.

Users wishing to use the system - dubbed Quick Tap - will need Orange and Barclaycard accounts as well as a handset set up for contactless payments.

The idea of the mobile wallet is gaining popularity around Europe.

Motorway toll

The service is made possible by Near Field Communication (NFC), the short-range wireless technology that underpins many wireless payment systems.

Quick Tap is a collaboration between Orange and Barclaycard. It will require a NFC-enabled Samsung Tocco Lite handset, which also goes on sale on Friday.

Only purchases up to a value of �15 can be made using the service but users can preload their mobile with up to �100.

"Having a wallet on my phone has made it much more convenient to make purchases on the move and I like that it allows me to keep track of what I'm spending as I go," said David Chan, chief executive of Barclaycard Consumer.

"It is going to start a revolution in the way we pay for things on the high street," added Pippa Dunn, vice president of Orange.

Other stores signed up the service include Subway, Little Chef, Wilkinson and the National Trust.

Later this summer, users will also be able to use the service to pay the toll on the M6 motorway.

Olympic vision

Giles Ubaghs, an analyst with Datamonitor, thinks take-up may be sluggish.

"It is an important first step but I think there could be a lack of incentive. Early adopters may like it for the novelty value but the majority just won't see the point," he said.

Mobile wallet services have been available in Japan for some years and operator DoCoMo NTT spent a good deal of cash getting them up and running.

"They even had to buy a convenience store chain to get the readers in there but all the evidence is that people don't use it that often. Only around 10% seem to use the NFC functionality on their phones," said Mr Ubaghs.

Mobile couponing, where people can swipe their handsets in order to get discounts on goods, could kickstart NFC technology, he thinks.

Or it could find popularity in the future as an alternative to Bluetooth.

"It may be used for swapping data from phone to phone or for, say, taking pictures from a phone and putting them on a TV," he said.

Nokia is believed to be bringing out an NFC-enabled version of the popular game Angry Birds later this year.

In 2009 O2 trialled contactless payments, using mobiles in place of the popular Oyster card which allows commuters to pay for their tube journeys.

It has said it will launch its mobile wallet service later this year.

By the time of the Olympics it is expected that transactions, transport and tickets will all be available via contactless technology.

Currently there are 50,000 stores with NFC-enabled readers in the UK.

Some 12.9 million credit and debit cards are already in circulation.

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Sony faces further security woes

19 May 2011 Last updated at 09:31 ET

A website set up by Sony to allow users to reset their passwords following last month's hack attack is itself subject to a security alert.

A Sony user discovered an exploit on the site that could have been used by hackers to impersonate users.

Password resets have been necessary following the exposure of 77 million Sony PlayStation users' personal details.

Sony admitted the sites were insecure but said no hack had occurred.

In its blog it said: "We temporarily took down the PSN password reset page. Contrary to some reports, there was no hack involved. In the process of resetting of passwords there was a URL exploit that we have subsequently fixed," Sony said in a statement.

It will be further embarrassment for the gaming giant and more inconvenience for its users.

"Anyone who has already reset their password is still able to gain access to the PSN but for those who haven't they wont be able to reset it until the servers go live again, which will be shortly," said a Sony spokesman.

Wesley Yin-Poole, news editor of gaming website Eurogamer explained what had happened.

"There was an exploit that allowed anyone to reset your password using just your e-mail address and date of birth, effectively locking them out of their own PlayStation account," he said.

E-mail addresses and dates of birth are some of the personal details thought to have been stolen by hackers last month.

"This is just another embarrassment hot on the heels of the hack attack. It is nowhere near as serious but will be another headache for Sony," he added.

The majority of PlayStation users are able to reset their password through their consoles rather than by going online.

On 20 April the Japanese electronics giant was forced to shut down its PlayStation network, after what has been described as the biggest hack attack in history.

Yesterday, Sony boss Howard Stringer said the firm did act quickly enough to tell users about the problems.

Sony has offered users a year's free identity protection and free games in order to persuade them back to the network.

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Netflix dominates US net traffic

19 May 2011 Last updated at 03:28 ET

Movie and TV streaming site Netflix is now the single biggest source of internet traffic in the US, according to research.

The data, gathered by network monitoring firm Sandvine, showed that in March the site accounted for 29.7% of downstream traffic at peak times.

That is more than web browsing and peer-to-peer file sharing.

Experts warned that as the trend grows, internet service providers will face costly upgrades to satisfy demand.

Even at off peak times Netflix accounted for a 22% average traffic share over a 24 hour period.

The site's popularity is part of a wider change in the nature of internet traffic.

The Sandvine report suggests that "real-time entertainment" - streaming of video and audio - is "continuing its journey to network dominance" and is responsible for 49.2% of peak time internet congestion in the US.

That represents a 44% increase since Autumn 2010. Researchers warned that at the current rate it would make up 55%-60% of all traffic by the end of the year.

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

It's very difficult to engineer a network that can scale to four times when there's a 'flash flood'. The Olympics are going to cause a problem."

End Quote Simon Davies Co-founder, IDNet

Traffic hog

In Europe, such streaming accounts for 33.2% of internet traffic, a percentage which has been rising for the past three years.

Netflix is not available in the UK, but Sandvine said that the BBC iPlayer - the biggest streamer of commercial content in the UK - has a 6.6% share of peak traffic.

YouTube remains the biggest video streaming site in the world, but the Google-owned site has shorter videos of lower quality - meaning small file sizes and less bandwidth consumed.

Changing patterns of consumption present a big challenge for internet service providers which can struggle under the strain of big live events such as the World Cup or the Royal Wedding.

Simon Davies, co-founder of UK-based IDNet, said ISPs were not geared up to take over from TV broadcasters.

"The problem comes with events like the World Cup and the Olympics, where you get 'flash floods'," he said.

"It's very difficult to engineer a network that can scale to four times when there's a 'flash flood'. The Olympics are going to cause a problem."

In the past, ISPs could handle heavy-loads by slowing down certain services, such as peer-to-peer file sharing, at peak times to manage the load.

"The problem with real-time content like movies or television content - especially or more so if it's live - is that you can't really do that because the user experience deteriorates," explained Sebastien Lahtinen from ThinkBroadband.com.

A spokesman for the Internet Service Providers Association told the BBC that the industry has acknowledged the challenges.

"ISPs are aware of this issue and manage their networks appropriately to cope with high quality content and continue to invest in upgrading their networks to improve capacity.

"ISPs also offer a number of broadband packages to accommodate users that require high bandwidth services.

"The UK's broadband market is extremely competitive and continues to deliver the best service possible for the end user."

However, Mr Lahtinen added that the user base demanding high-bandwidth services is growing rapidly, and that smaller ISPs may struggle to cope with investing in the necessary upgrades to keep a smooth service.

"If you have an ISP that's growing very very fast, who's trying to avoid paying very large costs until they absolutely need it, that's when you're more likely to see those problems," he said.

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Fake security software hits Macs

19 May 2011 Last updated at 08:35 ET

A fake security program for Apple computers called MACDefender has racked up a significant number of victims.

Hundreds of people who installed the software have turned to Apple's forums for help to remove it.

The program's tactic of peppering screens with pornographic pictures has made many keen to get rid of it.

MACDefender seems to have been successful because of the work its creators did to make it appear high up in search results.

The number of people seeking help was uncovered by ZDNet journalist Ed Bott. In a blog post, he wrote about finding more than 200 separate discussions on Apple's official forums about MACDefender.

The volume of reports about the problem was "exceptional" in his experience, he said.

The fake Mac anti-virus software, which goes by the name of both MACDefender and Mac Security, began circulating in early May and has steadily racked up victims.

Such programs, often called scareware, urge people to install software that then pretends to scan a machine for security problems. It then fabricates a list of threats it has found and asks for cash before it will fix these non-existent problems.

Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos, said the scareware's creators had turned to search engines to get the program in front of potential victims by linking it with innocuous phrases such as "Mother's Day".

"You search for something on Google Images, and when you click on an image you are taken to a webpage which serves up the attack - regardless of whether you are running Mac OS X or Windows," he said.

One trick the software uses to make people cough up cash quicker was to fire up the browser of unattended machines and call up one of several different pornographic websites.

Mr Cluley said the vast majority of malware that Sophos and other security firms see is aimed at Windows users. About 100,000 novel malicious programs for Windows are detected every day, he said.

"Although there is much less malware in existence for Mac OS X than there is for Windows, that's no reason to put your head in the sand and think that there are no Mac threats out there," he said.

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