There are more than 45,000 health apps – is data privacy being overlooked?

Spurred by the growth in wearables and health & well being apps, mHealth is growing fast, not just as a way to track personal fitness but as a way for medical professionals to improve patient care and remotely identify the signs of serious illness for example.  In the US it is estimated that wearables could drop hospital costs by 16 per cent over the five years, and remote patient monitoring technologies could save our healthcare system $200 billion over the next 25 years. What remains consistent is the need to generate and store vast amounts of patient data yet by its definition, …

Consumer Trust : Building a coalition of the willing

Privacy and security took centre stage at MEF’s 4th Annual Consumer Trust Summit last month in New York. Simon Bates, MEF’s Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives was on hand to witness the debate. When we reflected on last year’s Summit in Washington DC it was apparent that, while regulation plays an important role in building trust in mobile services, it’s not the whole story. This year we wanted to put commerce at the heart of the debate, examining how innovation and business development are shaped by consumer concerns around trust issues like privacy and security. So we bid …

Building the sustainable business of consumer trust

MEF’s fourth Annual Consumer Trust Summit was recently held in in New York, where mobile privacy experts, MEF members and guests met to discuss the business critical issue of consumer trust and privacy. MEF CEO Rimma Perelmuter opened the event, and here offers a call to action for the industry to address the growing need to build trust & empower mobile consumers via the next phase in MEF’s Consumer Trust initiative. Last month I was delighted to open MEF’s Consumer Trust Summit in New York. Our fourth annual event this year was co-located with Momentum’s Business of Privacy Summit and …

Mobile payment drivers: why we need to incentivise users

Mobile payments are growing globally.  With Apple Pay, Samsung Pay and Android Pay all maneuvering to capture market share, much of the future growth is touted to come from NFC payments - in-store (in developed markets at least).  For the consumer however the process of unlocking a phone, signing in, sending payment, receiving an e-receipt etc, is perhaps - when compared to tap and pay card payments- still a process that has *friction*. Here John Doornbusch, Solution Architect at global mobile payments provider and MEF member Novatti discusses what the mobile money levers are and how to …

The Business of Privacy

MEF’s 4th Annual Consumer Trust Summit, supported by F-Secure and AVG, takes place in New York City on 24 June, co-located with the 2nd Annual Privacy, Policy & Technology Summit. Where most conferences deal in the potential risks to businesses of getting privacy wrong, this event focuses on the opportunities it presents. Simon Bates, MEF's Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives explains more… What do people mean when they talk about ‘privacy’ in mobile apps and services? To some it means a regulatory headache: a big stick that might come crashing down on them in the shape of a …

Strategising safety for the Internet of Things – TRUSTe

What happens when 50 billion machines connect? That’s one of the big questions privacy advocates, business leaders and government agencies are asking themselves when strategising for the future safety of our data as the Internet of Things (IoT) grows. The privacy challenges of today’s connected world can seem daunting – and these challenges will continue to deepen as the IoT expands. Anyone interested in connected technology or buying smart gadgets knows that connected devices are everywhere. Ideas such as the connected car, the connected home (refrigerator, heating and air conditioning, …

What is Two-Factor Authentication? – Mblox

The widespread distribution of the internet and mobile devices means that more and more consumers are able to perform transactions, interact with their banks or simply book a holiday online, wherever they are, whenever they want.  As consumers we expect this spontaneity. Simple transactional processes are played out on every device, every day by nearly everybody. Hackers, bots and identity theft sit uncomfortably alongside the increased use and freedom to use transactional services. And in general, all that protects consumers is a few characters and numbers that are tapped in to the password …

Industry Views: Is Privacy And Consumer Trust Still Hampering The Mobile Industry?

The last few weeks have seen some interesting moves around mobile privacy and consumer trust. Business Insider reports that taxi / ride-share app, Uber, may be collecting seemingly unrelated user data including SMSLog call history, Wi-Fi connections used, GPS locations and every type of device ID possible. Elsewhere Twitter has been under the spotlight for announcing that it will start tracking which (other) apps its users have downloaded. There's still a big question mark over how much consumers understand the value-exchange (user data for a free service). The legal backstop for …

Podcast: the 3rd Annual MEF Consumer Trust Summit

Earlier this month we held our 3rd Annual Consumer Trust Summit, co-hosted by MEF members Dentons. In the shadow of the Washington Monument experts from the app community assembled alongside regulators from the US and Europe. The question on everyone’s lips wasn’t "is privacy and building trust still important?", rather, twelve months on from the Snowden revelations it was: "how can we speed up the process?" Simon Bates, MEF Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives, shares his impressions. Simon Rice of the UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office was on hand to provide the EU …

Exploring the next generation of mobile privacy policy

A lack of trust is the number one reason why consumers aren’t buying more with their mobiles. Last week, in Washington DC, MEF Members, co hosts Dentons and a collection of US and European regulators, app developers and industry experts gathered at the 3rd Annual MEF Consumer Trust Summit to discuss the latest developments in the business critical issue of Consumer Trust, and how the greatest barrier to m-commerce can be responsibly overcome. We'll bring you full coverage of the day next week here on the MEF Minute in the form of a series of podcasts recorded live at the event, so you can …

Now Apple’s shifted its focus to privacy and security, maybe the industry will follow

As the biggest company in the world offers a timely reminder of the importance of building consumer Trust, MEF''s Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives Simon Bates reflects on the upcoming Annual Summit to be held in Washington DC with co-hosts Dentons on the 10th June, and why consumer trust and privacy remain business critical issues. MEF Consumer Trust Summit 2014 Speakers Tim Spirapani VP of Law, Policy, Government Relations Application Developers Alliance Larry Magid Tech journalist, internet safety activist CBS News Debbie Matties,  Vice …

Revolutionizing How Ads Are Delivered to Consumers Across Mobile and Desktop Devices

Every day, consumers are inundated with random ads on their mobile devices and desktops that may have little on no relevance to them. In today’s ecosystem, advertisers have limited methods of identifying what consumers actually want to see in their digital advertising. Here Richard Qiu, Vice President of Business Development for Mobile at  TRUSTe, shares details of their recently released privacy-friendly solution,  TRUSTed Interests. MEFTV also caught up with Chris Babel, TRUSTe CEO, at MWC14 to find out more. Consumers spend more time on mobile than ever with 55% accessing the Internet by …

Apps World North America – Join MEF members for a FREE Privacy workshop

MEF is pleased to continue its partnership with the Apps World series following on from the European event in London last year. Next week's Apps World North America hits San Francisco’s Moscone Center West on February 5-6 and features one of the broadest ranges of content available, with 11 key conference tracks covering everything from gaming to mobile strategy. Join MEF members at Apps World for a free workshop on mobile privacy on the 5th Feb at 1:00pm and find out how to ensure your business can monetize data the right way, while hearing more about MEF’s free online privacy policy …

Spies like U.S. – Law enforcement agencies and your data

Are law enforcement agencies infiltrating servers to steal customer data? And, if so, what can we do about it? Simon Bates, MEF’s Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives details the steps you can take to protect your personal data. We all know how valuable data is to apps companies – many business models are based around sharing consumers’ personal information with advertisers and other third parties. In return, the app is often heavily discounted so, as long as the developer is sensitive to privacy concerns, everyone wins. However, people are waking up to the fact that there might be …

Mobile gaming for kids: stay on the right side of the law

The UK government recently shone a light on the underhand techniques some developers used to get kids and their parents to spend more on in-app purchases. Here MEF’s Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives, Simon Bates takes a look at the right and the wrong ways to involve kids in the app experience. Earlier this year, the UK Office of Fair Trading investigated 38 mobile games aimed at children. It found a number of causes for concern, and not just for kids and their parents. It is likely that many of the games-makers in question were in breach of several different laws and …

What’s the Deal with Adware on Android?

In most cases, the “free” Android applications you download from Google’s Play store aren’t free at all. These developers aren’t just developing apps for you out of the kindness of their collective hearts. Like most online services that don’t ask for the traditional up-front payment, the mobile application profit-model relies on advertising and in-app purchases.  Kaspersky Lab Mobile expert Brian Donohue explores the android app ecosystem . During the development process, whoever is building an application will often choose some third party ad library and bundle it into their app. Once an …

Standing room only for MEF privacy workshop at AppsWorld Europe

Steve ‘Woz’ Wozniak wasn’t the only draw at last month’s AppsWorld expo in London. More than 60 developers crammed into the Tech World workshop to hear about AppPrivacy – MEF’s free privacy policy generator. MEF Chair Andrew Bud hosted a panel including Martin Fanning, a partner at international law firm Dentons, James Pimentel-Pinto, a founding director of leading UK developer AgencyMobile, and MEF’s Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives, Simon Bates, who here summarises the session, which you can watch in full in the video below. MEF has long championed the importance of building …

Distimo & MEF Report on Worldwide App Store Trends

Ahead of the first MEF Global Forum in San Francisco on the 14-15th November, MEF has teamed up with app store analytics leader Distimo to release a free report showcasing global trends across the Apple and Google App stores in 16 different countries. As well as analysis of download volumes and revenues by category in established markets such as the U.S. and EU, the report also shines a light on trends in growth markets including South Korea, Brazil and South Africa. It found that the Apple App Store now accounts for 65 per cent of total revenues globally, with Google Play gaining ground in …

Australian Government publishes guide to mobile privacy

Simon Bates is MEF’s Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives - here he shares his thoughts on a recently published guide to Mobile privacy from the Australian Information Commissioner. Simon and other MEF members are hosting a free privacy workshop on October 23rd at Apps World Europe in London, that will explore best practice for data collection in mobile apps, featuring mobile industry privacy experts and the creators of MEF's online tool - AppPrivacy™. In September, the Australian Information Commissioner published a better practice document for mobile app developers. I know what …

MEF unveils AppPrivacy – the free privacy policy generator for mobile apps

Today MEF launched AppPrivacy™, a free resource for app developers around the world featuring a best practice privacy policy generator, with the goal to build consumer trust. Simon Bates, MEF’s Senior Advisor for Policy & Initiatives, takes us on a tour of its key features, and explores how the online tool is the result of more than a year’s collaboration by MEF's Privacy in Apps Working Group. Why App Privacy? And why now? In previous posts I've stressed the need for app developers to think hard about their use of personal information. Privacy is a hot topic right now in the US, …