Find out the week’s top mobile stories from around the world.
This week.. Ban or no ban, Facebook wins in U.S. threats against TikTok, TikTok reportedly mulls corporate changes, California Consumer Privacy Act shatters attributable mobile advertising rates and much more…
Ban or no ban, Facebook wins in U.S. threats against TikTok
Tech Crunch
On Monday, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that the U.S. is “looking at” banning Chinese social media apps, including the Chinese-owned company TikTok, comparing it to other Chinese companies like Huawei and ZTE that have been deemed national security threats by the current administration. “With respect to Chinese apps on people’s cell phones, I can assure you that the United States will get this one right, too,” Pompeo said.
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TikTok reportedly mulls corporate changes amid growing security concerns
Tech in Asia
Chinese internet major ByteDance is considering changing up the corporate structure of TikTok as the app remains under scrutiny in the US and India over security concerns.
The company’s executives are now weighing some options, including forming a new management board for TikTok and establishing a separate headquarters for the app outside of China, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing a person familiar with the matter.
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California Consumer Privacy Act shatters attributable mobile advertising rates
Pocket Gamer
Following Apple’s decision to make its Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA) explicitly opt-in on a per app basis in the forthcoming iOS 14, there’s been plenty of debate about what this means for the $80 billion mobile app advertising sector.
Coincidentally, the launch of the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), which became law on 1 January 2020 but wasn’t enforced until 1 July, provides some guidance about what might happen.
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A Concerning Proliferation of SIM-Swapping Fraud in Europe
Infosecurity Magazine
In March 2020, Europol announced that it had arrested more than two dozen people suspected of draining bank accounts by hijacking victims’ phone numbers via SIM-swap fraud. The cross-border investigation lasted eight months with a collaboration between the Romanian National Police (Poliția Română) and the Austrian Criminal Intelligence Service (Bundeskriminalamt), with the support of Europol, leading to the arrest of 14 members of a crime gang who emptied bank accounts in Austria by gaining control over their victims’ phone numbers.
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British mobile carriers warn removing Huawei will cause ‘blackouts’ and cost billions
CNBC
British mobile network operators have warned that removing Huawei equipment from their networks could lead to severe disruption for customers, with Vodafone going as far as to say it would cost the firm billions of pounds.
Andrea Dona, Vodafone’s head of networks in the U.K., said Wednesday that the carrier would have to spend “single-figure billions” if it was forced to swap Huawei telecoms kit out for another vendor’s.
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App Annie: Mobile gamers broke app store records in Q2 2020
Venturebeat
Mobile apps and gaming surged to the highest levels ever recorded — with games in particular scoring 14 billion downloads — in the second quarter of 2020, according to mobile data and analytics researcher App Annie.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, consumers downloaded nearly 35 billion new apps and spent $27 billion in Q2 2020. The strong success is no surprise, but App Annie believes that even as lockdown restrictions are gradually lifted, the habits folks are forming now will carry over.
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How Enterprise Mobility is Being Influenced by AI and Machine Learning
IoT For All
We are living in a uber-digital world where each and every part of our life is touched by technology. In fact, since the time we wake till the time we go to sleep, we depend on the usage of technology, smart devices and digital tools to meet our daily needs – either personal or professional, including business as well as consumer requirements. The way technology is advancing, there is no stopping of this dynamic movement and its ever-growing influence.
If we are allowed to talk about one single technology that is making a whole lot of noise today, it will be Artificial Intelligence.
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IoT: device management and security are crucial
Tech Radar
The tipping point for Internet of Things (IoT) development has arrived, as more companies design solutions to help them mine new sources of valuable data to transform their enterprises. A recent Economist Business Unit report found that nearly 60 percent of companies are using IoT technologies and a similar percentage are seeing much better-than-expected return on investment.
Yet the Economist report also revealed some frustrations about the pace of progress in IoT development as companies seek to speed their time-to-value.
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Nigeria: Opera subsidiaries are the latest companies to quit the country
The Africa Report
After a profitable 2019 for the Norway based Chinese-backed OPay, the company has announced that several of its subsidiaries will be exiting Nigeria or temporarily stopping operations. In 2018, Chinese investors backed the startup with $180 million to take over the mobile money space in Nigeria.
By June 2019 Opay diversified its offering to launch a bike-hailing service, a bus transport service, a food delivery company, an investment arm and a loan service to Nigerian customers served through one app.
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The Future of Mobile: In Blockchain We Trust
Payments Journal
After immense investment in blockchain projects, some of the most profound applications of blockchain yet again began appearing last year – the entire industry was excited about the potential applications of this technology.
In particular for the mobile industry, blockchain was the talk of the town. With the explosion in connected networks and devices, and the start of MIoT and 5G deployments worldwide, blockchain offered a very promising solution to address new complex enterprise offerings and transactions executed at the edge of the network.
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