ARM Community: Remote Mobile Transactions with the Convenience and Security You Want - ARM Community

I dread internet shopping, but maybe that’s just a male adverse reaction to shopping in general. I know that as soon as I’ve eventually found what I want, filled the basket and get to the checkout it’s where I realize that I’ve left my wallet in another other room. Then I get asked to pick a username and password (this is crazy! I don’t plan to come back and buy a second shed any time soon!), so I enter the same username and password I use all over the internet because I can’t remember them all. Then delivery address, billing address, expiry date and those funny three numbers on the back or the front four if it’s Amex. And just when I think I’ve paid and I can think of how great my life will be with my new shed, my bank decides to inconvenience me with an extra security check. I’m whisked off to my bank’s website where I’m asked to enter a password. Eh? Is this a phishing attack? Oh forget, it I’ll buy my shed elsewhere, this is just too much hassle! The dream vanishes.

Things have got to get better than this. Good news is they can and strangely it could be thanks to contact-less payments with secure user interfaces (see previous blog). Imagine for a moment, an open OS mobile device capable of browsing the web and running web applications, an embedded security chip that holds your bank application (such as your ARM SecurCore SIM card) and a means of securing the keypad for PIN entry with ARM TrustZone. The machine you’re browsing from has your bank card and a Point-of-Sales terminal built in! No need to go hunting for your wallet, no need to enter all the data, no need to pick a username and password. Better still, a highly secure tunnel can link your payment card directly to a secure payment server and your PIN can be captured securely as well.

What we could see is that remote transactions become as simple as Chip&PIN when the card holder is present at the transaction in the real world. Mobile internet payments on ARM hardware could be as simple as Click&PIN!

Where’s the first place that you want to make a mobile payment? Can I answer any questions on mobile transactions?

For more information, see my related blogs:
Contact-less payments and NFC
Online Banking and Mobile Banking

Also, be sure to stop by ARM's Core Conversation at SXSW-Interactive: Mobile Payments: My Smartphone Just Bought My Beer! Sunday, March 13th at 5:00PM.

Rob Brown, Secure Solutions Segment Marketing, ARM. Rob joined ARM in 2005 to drive design wins in the Smart Card segment. He is now responsible for directing ARM security market strategy and business development which includes ARM products such as TrustZone and SecurCore, external partnerships and supporting industry activity. Prior to joining ARM he worked for 8 years in the RFID sector in start-up companies and silicon IP providers for NFC and played an active role in the in defining the support for the NFC Forum Type 1 tag. He holds a Bachelors degree in Electronic Engineering from the University of Manchester. He is a certified payments geek and is waiting impatiently for the first devices that can make payments faster and easier to use. He looks forward to the day when he can buy whatever he wants from whoever’s got it, wherever they are with a single click.