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Programming IT Technology

Location-based Security for Wireless Apps 60

Posted by michael from the invisible-perimeter dept.
developerWorks writes "Studies by industry analysts forecast even greater demand for wireless and mobile devices, creating substantial opportunities for wireless device application and service providers. Faced with an increasingly difficult challenge in raising both average revenue per user (ARPU) and numbers of subscribers, wireless carriers and their partners are developing a host of new products, services, and business models based on data services. This article looks at location-based services, security, and how they boost both service and revenue."
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Location-based Security for Wireless Apps More

Location-based Security for Wireless Apps

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  • My radio... (Score:2, Funny)

    by Economist ( 466965 )
    ... is supposed to be wireless too, but the one time i took a screwdriver to check ... i found out i was really f*cked by that salesman ;-)

    • Re:My radio... (Score:2, Funny)

      by Fizzl ( 209397 )

      This reminds me of a company my friend used to work for. the companys main product was (is?) wireless hardware for net-access. His supervisor didn't always think everything throught.
      Best example was once he stormed into the server room which was in middle of re-arragment and tripped on one ethernet cable that was laying near the doorway. The boss promptly proceeded to yank the cable out of the machine it was attached to, screaming: "What the f*ck is this!?! We are supposed to be WIRELESS!!".

      Friend promised: "I will explain you as fast as you plug that back in, I believe few hundred of our customers don't want to wait till I explain to you exactly what that wire is for..."

    • Re:My radio... (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      "i was really f*cked by that salesman"

      Your keyboard is missing the U key. That salesman really fucked you this time. You should consider shopping elsewhere.

  • Not another buzzword (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @08:59AM (#4766699)


    Faced with an increasingly difficult challenge in raising both average revenue per user (ARPU)

    I swear, if ARPU becomes the next buzzword, I'll die!

    • It's about money, money, money: so rest assured that this is going to be a buzzword, a buzzword with an ever growing importance. But we give you our solemn pledge that we'll visit the grave of the anonymous coward!
    • Any technology paper that starts talking about "business models" scares me. I can't help but think that "business model" is just a scheme to use intellectual property, lawyers and standards bodies to put a cash siphon between the "real" producer of something of value and the consumer.

      Yes, I know its a b-school buzzword for explaining how specific industries or businesses operate, but even that informs me that there's not common sense, old-fashioned, buy low-sell high capitalism behind this idea, but instead there's a fast-buck, get-in-get-rich mentality behind it..
    • [gripe] Huh? Year-long contracts don't provide enough revenue already? [/gripe]
      While mobile communications are a partial extension of the internet, I cannot see why advertising wouldn't eventually appear in the wireless realm.
      • It does for me already (at least for my T-Mobile cell phone). I have to listen to that chick read ads to me before I can check my voicemail. Well, I can skip it, but she has one hell of a sexy voice, plus they reward me for listening with free minutes.
    • It does make good slang: "Hey you cut me off!" "ARP-U, buddy!"
    • Too late. ARPU has been a buzzword for a while. Gartner uses it all over the place. Its all over the telco space.

  • Wireless and Global Positioning (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Gary Franczyk ( 7387 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:01AM (#4766712)
    Though it sounds a little bit "big-brothery" for my wireless device to know where I am at all times, I know that it is going to happen anyway. They can already triangulate the location of your cellphone. We might as well use it for location specific apps.

    I can think of TONS of great apps that would be location specific. For instance, a GPS that would tell you where the nearest Pizza Hut is. A Or a two-way radio or other device that also told you WHERE the other person is. Paying tolls automatically is a good one too.

  • gonna take more than that... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Slack0ff ( 590042 ) <{matbrady} {at} {bored.com}> on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:01AM (#4766718)
    Wireless security is still many inovations away fomr being as secure as a land line. I personally would never do anything over wireless that I would not do on a public computer, the idea of truly securing wireless is easier said then done.
    • Just to appoligize before someone else points it out, yes I did misspell from... im a dumbass, exuse my stupidity
    • >I personally would never do anything over wireless
      >that I would not do on a public computer

       You are right to say that wireless networks are far away nowadays for being a safe medium, but to compare with a public computer is going to far.
      If you are protected by ssl (https, pops, ssh, imaps) your transactions are safe, but in a public computer risk are much bigger, as keyboards loggers.
    • Wireless security is still many inovations away from being as secure as a land line.

      Yup, and securing based on location can throw away the key benefit of wireless access. If you have to be in a particular area to access certain apps or information, what's the benefit of going wireless? Just hook up to a wire and get better bandwidth.

      Yes, okay, it'd be nice wander all over our corporate headquarters and still keep access to my files and such, but Xterms and thin clients already offer that, with much less risk of wardriving.

  • Hrmm (Score:3, Insightful)

    by acehole ( 174372 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:03AM (#4766726) Homepage
    Shouldnt there be a 802.11b/wireless topic?

  • Not again (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Marijuana al-Shehi ( 609113 )
    wireless carriers and their partners are developing a host of ... business models

    Developing business models a la myextremefuneral.com? I hope all the VCs learned their lesson during the last gold rush: the only viable business model consists of selling a product or service for a profit.

  • Regardless of location, the screens are too small. (Score:4, Funny)

    by dagg ( 153577 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:05AM (#4766740) Journal
    There just isn't enough room on my cell-phone screen to fit any (more) advertisements. Besides... what difference does it make where I am? There is always a Starbucks within a one-block radius.
    --

    Your sex on the go. [tilegarden.com]

    • Re:Regardless of location, the screens are too sma (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      There just isn't enough room on my cell-phone screen to fit any (more) advertisements

      We're working on that! The next generation of cell phones will have a second screen just for popups. Thanks for the tip--we're securing a patent at the present.

      Love,
      The Industry

  • And yet... (Score:2, Funny)

    by YanceyAI ( 192279 )
    Wireless is nifty, but I won't really be happy until a chip in my brain is recieving data and I get a nice little readout in my peripheral vision. Neruomancer anyone?
  • The only interesting thing in that article is the notion that companies will use location info as a security measure to insure that you really are where you say you are, or to track people down when they do illegal stuff over their phone.

    I can just picture it now-- I get my PIN wrong three times trying to check my bank balance, and two cops come over and arrest me.

  • So basically, (Score:4, Insightful)

    by sawilson ( 317999 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:15AM (#4766801) Homepage
    What I'm reading is that they are trying to figure
    out a way to stuff more features into wireless
    computing so they can charge more for those features.
    Also, (as mentioned by an earlier poster) they'll
    have the ability to figure out where you are at
    all times so they can specifically target you with
    information that they think you'll need. Sounds like
    doubleclick.net would love to get in on this. It would
    be the next level in geek fetish toys. The ezpass
    thing, (as said earlier) is cool though. Not to
    mention:

    Ads popping up as you drive by places telling you
    what you should buy there. Example - You just passed Dick Monalds and our McRib is only a buck
    today!

    Or, Playing at the theatre today, this movie, that
    movie. This cool one starts in 5 minutes!

    As long as there are serious user controls, this
    could be a cool thing. The interface is going to
    have to be freaking stellar and unobtrusive to
    keep people from sending their SUV's through
    krogers when their cellphone, pager, and pda all
    go off at once.

    • Re:So basically, (Score:5, Interesting)

      by kableh ( 155146 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:24AM (#4766864) Homepage
      Ahh, the free market at work =)

      Location based services is one of the features the product my company [meshnetworks.com] has developed offers. The concept is the same as with GPS, or triangulation in general. However, one thing calculating location within the network offers over GPS is the ability to calculate position relative to other users and/or infrastructure. This has amazing implications for use in automobiles and other transportation apps. When the Firestone tires on your SUV blowout, your car could signal back to other cars raising an alarm perhaps, warning other drivers, slowing down traffic, etc. It might even be the first step towards "smart highways".

      And of course, if you are as directionally deficient as I am, knowing where you are all the time would be a good start =). Location information coupled with real-time, up to date maps would make sure I never get lost again.
      • This reminds me of a startup I was involved with
        a while ago. The idea was that your palm VII would
        signal the airport billing system when you got there and automatically
        get you a ticket on your prefered airline. We were
        actually most of the way there until PSI.net starting
        having delusions of granduer and bought metamore out
        from under us. We even had a way figured out to make
        the three different ticketing systems work together
        seemlessly. I suppose someone smart could pitch
        something like that today, and probably pull it
        off in light of this slashdot story. :)
    • If the phone company is in charge then yes, its value added fees. Like the UK traffic congestion service that vodaphone run, that works out where you are and gives you info on traffic: for a fee. The best bit - I think the network itself provides traffic flow data; if a line of phones are moving across the cells at 80mph, that says a lot about road conditions.

      But if our laptops can get location data then we can have some fun. Want to see what films are on nearby? send a lat/long to IMDB and get a listing (they dont do this, though they did informally a while back). Want to know where your friends are: go to your IM server and check their locations. Better yet; your laptop can even change time zone based on where it is -wouldnt that be a good thing.

      see my paper on [hp.com]
      context aware laptops for more ideas.

      -steve

  • Honestly... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Undaar ( 210056 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:16AM (#4766806) Homepage
    How much do we really need to be in constant communication with the rest of the world? Don't people want to be able to get away from work? Do we really need yet *another* place to see ads? I'm starting to understand what my grandfather used to say (see my sig.)
    • How much do we really need to be in constant communication with the rest of the world? Don't people want to be able to get away from work?

      Here is a little-known fact: THESE DEVICES CAN BE TURNED OFF. If you don't want to be reached, push that magical little button, et voila!

  • wrong formula, again (Score:3, Interesting)

    by YrWrstNtmr ( 564987 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:16AM (#4766807)
    Faced with an increasingly difficult challenge in raising both average revenue per user (ARPU) and numbers of subscribers,

    whoa...hold the phone here. MUST it be both?
    Why not:
    (Good service + small fee per subscriber) * large # of subscribers = PROFIT.

    Probably they just want to get as much as possible before the inevitable shredding party, SEC investigation, the jailing of the scape goats, the private island for the honchos, annd the abandonment of the public.

    Screw long term growth. Get it now.
  • average revenue per user (ARPU)

    I have something else that is average per user, but I don't think I can say it here.

  • How does this make it more secure? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by sifi ( 170630 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:20AM (#4766834)
    I can see that location information can be very useful, but how does it make it secure?

    It is almost impossible to replicate location information and use it elsewhere to gain unauthorized entry. Even if the information is intercepted during communications, an intruder cannot replicate that data from some other place...

    Why not? if I'm that bothered to gain access, surely I can cripple a device to generate bogus location information?
  • I've been involved in different kinds of mobile services projects for 3 1/2 years and the whole time the hype about location based services has been going on. I've never ever seen anyone use any kind of location based service in "real life" yet.

    Finnish mobile phone manufacturer Benefon [benefon.com] has had a really cool phone, ESC [benefon.com]that combines GPS location, GSM and a map application -- and the phone is just not selling...

    I starts to seem that the whole location based service concept is going to be the next WAP: over hyped and under utilized.

    • I've been involved in different kinds of mobile services projects for 3 1/2 years and the whole time the hype about location based services has been going on. I've never ever seen anyone use any kind of location based service in "real life" yet.

      I don't know if there is anyone out there with more info, but isn't this exactly what Steve Wozniak is currently working on? That is the impression that I have received from his web-site [woz.com]. Does anyone out there have more info? I am far more interested in what Wozniak has cooking than all of the cell networks put together.

  • So now we have a security system that encourages tresspassing? I'd think GPS information can't be THAT accurate, so there might very well be a thief with a PDA outside your window, stealing your corporate secrets.
    • As it stands normal GPS is accurate to within a few meters (10's). For really high accuracy within a campus area differential GPS could significantly boost that accuracy...
    • Well, the accuracy varies. In the best case scenario, it get down to a couple meters as in 10' or so. In worse case, it can be off by a couple kilometers (a mile or so). Using a combination of cell and gps determination, a couple different companies have managed to get location determination down to a couple meters most of the time. What most of the time means is a gray definition coined by some marketing dork. What it means in numbers. I've seen numbers as high as 80% of the time it will return with a couple meters and as low as 30%. When embedded software start to use reflected GPS signals to improve accuracy, you're going to see accuracy down to feet. The software already exists and the method for doing so is well known in the GPS field.
  • 802.11b is a security nightmare. Ask any network administrator worth his salt and he'll tell you the same thing.

    Between LEAP and every other 4 letter acronym that's supposed to be more secure, it's hard to even deploy a fairly secure wireless network without nearly shitting one's pants due to fear of such poor security.

    Not to mention the fact that regardless of the fact that all the _clients_ are without wires, you still have to put dozens and dozens of the box transmitters all around, in the perfect locations, or else your entire wireless network will be _useless_.

  • Good info and examples (Score:3, Informative)

    by hrbrmstr ( 324215 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @09:55AM (#4767105) Homepage Journal
    If you want more info on GIS with some decent links (including s/w that runs on linux and Java applications) to relevant examples, check out this article [dailywireless.org] at dailywireless.org.

    It's a good page to start from if the IBM article feels a bit dry.
  • Studies by industry analysts forecast even greater demand for wireless and mobile devices, creating substantial opportunities for wireless device application and service providers.
    I'd like to know which studies have shown that. Wasn't there a lot of "studies" that had shown that there would be a huge increase in demand for telecom equipment too? Everybody banked heavily on that, and got really burned.

  • Location information for mobile phones. (Score:3, Funny)

    by sifi ( 170630 ) on Wednesday November 27, 2002 @10:08AM (#4767224)
    Most of my mobile phone conversations consist of:

    >Hello, I'm [here], where are you?
    >Oh, I'm [here]
    >Now I'm [here] can you see me.
    >Sorry you broke up, what did you say?
    >I'm [here], I can't see you.
    etc...

    It would be great if I had a phone which allowed my to find my friends. Of cousre the phone companies would hate it, they'd loss loads of $ on all those uncessary lengthy phone calls.

    • Re:Location information for mobile phones. (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Sorry you broke up, what did you say?

      You must be one of those rare female Slashdot readers!

      If someone called a male cellphone user about a breakup, only an awkward, embarrased silence would follow as the poor guy would desperately come up with an appropriate line.

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