All posts under tagged ‘mobile services’

Feed for all posts filed under "mobile services"

VOIP, Mobile Services Expected to Be in Demand in Two Emerging Markets

Source: www.voip-news.com

Angola and Mozambique represent two emerging communications market where revenues from mobile communications are expected to be considerably higher over the next few years, according to a new report from Frost & Sullivan.

“Mozambique and Angola are both emerging from long civil wars,” said Frost & Sullivan research analyst Silvia Hirano Venter. “Their governments have put together reconstruction plans to rebuild the basic infrastructure from roads and power supply to communications.”

According to Frost & Sullivan:

Many foreign companies have been attracted to these countries due to their available commodities and high GDP growth rates. They are creating a demand for a range of services, with communications being high on the list. As they are not just basing themselves in cities with established fixed-line infrastructure, there is a significant opportunity for mobile technologies.

“Foreign companies are importing staff from countries with developed technology, so they are likely to demand services like VoIP and value added services,” Venter said. “Operators are therefore investing in infrastructure development to support these services.”

Additionally, local populations are increasing in their demands for communication services including basic voice and sms.

“Operators in both countries will have to look at offering services that are in line with the needs of the population,” Venter says. “For instance, services customised to sugar farmers in Mozambique, such as commodity prices on demand, could be quite successful.”

Published on May 12th, 2009 under , , , , , , , ,

Hannah Montana Crank Calls: VoIP Mischief

Source: gigaom.com

Crank calls have never been so easy.

As folks on Reddit have pointed out, Disney’s Hannah Montana Wake-Up Call makes getting up to no good a snap. Just enter your friend’s victim’s phone number and the delightful Miley Cyrus’s voice will wake them up or send them a reminder: “Dear [name], don’t forget that today you have [activity].”

Opening a web-to-phone system to the public without authentication or constraints may be fun — but it’s also ripe for abuse. Without authentication of the sender, users are free to enter any source phone number they want, making it look like the calls are coming from someone else. There’s no opt-out mechanism or audit trail. Even attempts to constrain the system can be circumvented: You can change the recipient’s time zone and wake them up in the middle of the night, or back-date the wake-up call to have it placed immediately.

Visitors must be over 18 to use the service — not exactly Cyrus’ fan base. But it probably won’t make the calls any more mature or limit the mischief.

As we integrate Internet, telephony, mobility and video, we can’t forget the lessons learned online. It’s too easy to let features like authentication, transparency, opt-out and masquerading prevention fall by the wayside in a land grab for names and numbers.

After just 10 hours on Reddit people were reporting the service was swamped, yielding messages like, “Sorry, that number’s already been scheduled for five calls.” Page load times were sluggish, and the fun is likely to end soon.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a sister who needs a wake-up call.

Published on August 4th, 2008 under , , , , ,

Member of "Hype Media! Network"