Comment by 3xblah | Hacker News Reader

Comment by 3xblah | Hacker News Reader

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I see these problems from a different angle than the usual commentators. I continue to ask myself: Why is mobile used for important things, e.g., banking, payments, etc.?

A great example is authenticating a person's identity via possession of a SIM card, i.e., their mobile number. If one can switch SIM cards, then one can switch identities. This flexibility is not a flaw in mobile communications; the ease-of-use is what makes mobile so useful. However it is silly to pretend mobile is as safe as landline for all uses. Mobile may be altogether more useful than landline -- few could argue otherwise -- and at the same time it can be entirely inappropriate for use in important things like banking. This concept seems non-existant. Instead the prevailing thinking is all-or-nothing.

In addition to "convenience", mobile has introduced a new class of problems when used for important things like banking and payments. These problems either do not exist or exist at a much lower scale with respect to landline. Who owns landline service? Crooks?

From where I stand, the risks of using mobile for important transactions outweigh the benefits. Unfortunately, I also see that "convenience" continues to prevail over common sense. I am willing to sacrafice convenience for peace of mind. Meanwhile banks and others push harder and harder for customers to use mobile, including as a means of verifying identity.

The world is going to leave you behind fast if you're using a landline because you're too scared of mobile phones...

In fact, most of my payments these days are with Apple Pay. My interactions with my bank and the stock market are all through my phone.

My bank protects me from fraud. It's really not that big of a deal - especially not to a point where using a landline makes any sense.

> These problems either do not exist or exist at a much lower scale with respect to landline.

Except for an ever-growing amount of the population doesn't have a landline -- only mobile.

The vast majority of people do not have a land line. Per World Bank data, there are 12 landlines per 100 people and 102 mobile lines per 100 people.

What are the statistics for businesses?

How many landlines per business entity?

Are the vast majority of businesses using cellphones exclusively? Why not?

Is a business accessing their lines via voip considered a landline?

Businesses only care about fraud losses they have to pay. SIMs only exist because cellphone companies wanted to cut off free riders. The efficiency gain from online transaction versus teller asissted far exceeds fraud losses. Passwords remain the default authenticator, which are often Password1, Linkedin2009, 123456. Password reset questions are added to minimize tech support costs or just check an audit box. SMS is the band-aid over guessable passwords. Not everyone has a smartphone. If businesses don't want to pay for password reset calls, they certainly aren't going to issue customer smartcards or open retail locations where they check two forms of ID.

> SIMs only exist because cellphone companies wanted to cut off free riders.

I thought SIMs were just an evolution of "calling card" tech, originally intended to be slotted into a payphone. A cell phone is just a miniature payphone which holds onto a single "calling card" long-term.

>Why is mobile used for important things

In the developing world, this is often the only link people have to the Internet at large. I worked in a company with primarily Nigerians and one of the biggest developments in recent years are payment systems built over mobile networks.

Since most other countries don't bundle the phone with a contract and SIM-lock them, SIM-swapping is a very reasonable way to pay-as-you-go while hopping between mobile networks and regions.

>However it is silly to pretend mobile is as safe as landline for all uses

What's the alternative for people lacking wired infrastructure? It's not desktop systems, it's not landlines, and they can't rely on the government to solve these problems for them.

What may be the only alternative for important transactions, and a sensible one, for people in the developing world may not necessarily be the most sensible alternative for people in developed countries who have more alternatives, such as wired service. The article focuses on AT&T, a carrier in the developed world.

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