Find out the week’s top mobile stories from around the world.
This week.. Amazon launched a “Pay with Amazon” feature for mobile apps, Facebook reported an increase in government requests for data, Snapchat tripled its video views since May, plus much more.
Amazon Launches “Pay With Amazon” Buttons for Mobile Apps
Re/code
Amazon says it is finally ready to turn its huge customer base into a big payments business outside of Amazon. For real this time.
The e-commerce giant is bringing its “Pay with Amazon” buttons to mobile apps, while “tripling down” on placing its Pay with Amazon buttons on websites in overseas markets like Japan. The moves are the latest in the company’s on-again, off-again efforts to take advantage of the more than 200 million customer accounts it has on file by processing payments on websites outside of its own walls.
Earlier this year, Amazon hired PayPal vet Patrick Gauthier to lead a newly created team dedicated solely to building a payments business across the Web and app world. The payments industry is watching closely.
Read more…
Apple Says It’s Against Opening Encrypted Data for Britain
VentureBeat
Apple is opposed to a new British law it says would require it to provide authorities with access to encrypted data as it would create vulnerabilities hackers could exploit, Chief Executive Tim Cook said on Wednesday.
Britain last week unveiled a draft surveillance bill that would place explicit obligations on service providers to help intercept data and hack suspects’ devices, potentially undermining the end-to-end encryption on Apple’s iMessages.
Read more…
Alibaba Singles’ Day Sales Reach $14.3 Billion, Smashing Record
Bloomberg
Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. logged a record 91.2 billion yuan ($14.3 billion) in sales on Singles’ Day, turning a sweethearts’ holiday dreamed up two decades ago into a major online shopping event.
Transactions had passed last year’s record of $9.3 billion before midday in China, according to the company. The top-selling items by retailers using Alibaba’s platform included baby-related and nutritional products, Nike sneakers and Levi’s jeans, the company said.
Read more…
Mobile Health: A Largely Untapped Market for Healthcare
mHealth Intelligence
Consumers want access to health records and physicians – apps lack capability
Consumers want health apps to do more for their lives, to “more accurately communicate and monitor their health.” But product sophistication and an accurate understanding of consumer profiles limit capability.
A recent study published by the Journal of Medical Internet Research and designed by New York University revealed the consumer perspective of health app use in the U.S.
Read more…
Snapchat Reaches 6 Billion Daily Video Views, Tripling From 2 Billion In May
TechCrunch
On the heels of Facebook’s announcement last week that they had surpassed 8 billion daily video views, Snapchat confirmed to the FT over the weekend that users of the ephemeral messaging app were now watching 6 billion videos every day.
What’s really notable about this latest reveal is how quickly it seems like video is taking off for Snapchat even though it’s been around on the service since late 2012. The last reported video viewing numbers for Snapchat were in September when it announced that there were 4 billion videos being watched through the app daily. In May, Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel told Bloomberg that the company had 2 billion daily video views.
Read more…
Apple is Reportedly Working on Peer-To-Peer Payments
Engadget
Apple is reportedly in negotiations with US banks to create a mobile personal payment platform that would compete with PayPal’s popular Venmo app. The Wall Street Journal, citing unnamed sources close to the talks, states that discussions are currently ongoing though there’s no confirmation that any banks have actually signed on yet.
There’s also virtually no information on how the system would actually work. The WSJ states that the service would allow users to wirelessly transfer funds from their checking accounts to other Apple devices, presumably using an extension of the company’s existing Apple Pay feature.
Read more…
Facebook Reports Increase in Government Requests for Data
The Times of India
Facebook said in a report that government demands for its user data surged in the first half of 2015, taking a trend that began at least two years ago when the company started revealing such requests to new heights.
Government access to personal data from telephone and web companies has become a contentious privacy issue since former spy agency contractor Edward Snowden revealed surreptitious surveillance programs.
Read more…
Nigeria: Mobile internet users rise to 97.2 million
IT News Africa
The number of mobile internet users on Nigeria’s telecoms networks had reached 97.21 million on 30 September, up from the 95.37 million recorded in August. This is according to the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC).
According to the NCC, both the GSM and CDMA networks increased by 1.84 million in September 2015.
Read more…
Many Babies and Toddlers Use Mobile Devices Every Day
Harvard Health
This likely isn’t a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention to the world around them, but a study just published in the journal Pediatrics shows that 44% of children under the age of 1 use mobile devices every day. By the age of 2, that jumps to 77%.
By age 4, half of the children in the study had their own TV — and three-quarters had their own mobile device. And these weren’t rich kids, either; the study was done at an urban, low-income practice in Philadelphia.
