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Find out the week’s top mobile stories from around the world.

This week.. Marketers call on launch of Google’s privacy sandbox to be halted, Apple to push ahead with controversial privacy feature opposed by Facebook and tthers, Nokia enables global enterprise IoT connectivity for China Mobile and much more…

Marketers call on launch of Google’s Privacy Sandbox to be halted

Mobile Marketing Magazine

An alliance of leading technology and publishing businesses have come together to call on the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to block Google’s launch of its ‘Privacy Sandbox’ technology.

The Marketers for an Open Web (MOW) have written to the CMA to ask it to use its powers to put a stop to Google’s plans. The Privacy Sandbox – due to launch in early 2021 – would remove login, advertising, and other features from the open web on Google’s Chrome browser and place them under the control of the tech giant.

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Apple To Push Ahead With Controversial Privacy Feature Opposed By Facebook And Others

The Independent

Apple says that it will press ahead with a controversial privacy feature that has set it against companies including Facebook.
Responding to a letter from a host of privacy campaigners, the company said that it is fully committed to the new update and would be rolling it out early next year.

Apple software chief Craig Federighi told The Independent that the feature and the company’s support for privacy is a “core value”, and that the change grew out of a longstanding, philosophical commitment against excessive data collection.

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Nokia enables global enterprise IoT connectivity for China Mobile

Computer Weekly

The internet of things (IoT) has rapidly grown from local to global. In the latest example of the worldwide phenomenon, China Mobile IoT (CMIoT), a subsidiary of the China Mobile Communications Corporation, has selected Nokia to ensure delivery of IoT connectivity and services to CMIoT’s customers across its domestic arena and the international markets.

The partnership will see CMIoT expand its international OneLink IoT capabilities, which will be underpinned by Nokia’s Worldwide IoT Network Grid (Wing) managed service.

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Deep Dive: Using Phone Verification And Text Messaging For Secure Checkouts

PYMNTS

Many banks, utility companies and government agencies have been leveraging two-factor authentication (2FA) for several years. This process requires consumers to provide not only their usernames and passwords to access services, but also an additional form of verification such as a biometric identifier or a code that can be emailed to them or sent via text message. The U.S. Social Security Administration, for example, requires recipients using its website to provide unique eight-digit codes sent via text to their smartphones in addition to their usernames and passwords when they sign up or log in.

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5G – an emerging energy challenge

Smart Energy

5G is set to lead to increased energy use as the number of users and the associated infrastructure grows.

5G appears set to join other 21st century technologies that are transformative, such as bitcoin mining, artificial intelligence and cloud computing/data centres, but also energy hungry.

In the case of 5G, it is not that the technology itself is energy inefficient. Over time, each successive generation of mobile technology has become more energy efficient measured in terms of kilowatthours per gigabyte.

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UK to impose new rules to limit tech giants’ power

BBC

The UK will impose new rules next year aimed at preventing Google and Facebook from abusing their market dominance.
The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said the two firms accounted for around 80% of the £14bn ($18.7bn) spent on advertising online in 2019.

The new regime will attempt to give consumers more control over their data. It will also “help small businesses thrive, and ensure news outlets are not forced out by bigger rivals,” according to the government.

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What’s Stopping Phone Manufacturers from Global Crypto Adoption?

Securities.io

Widespread crypto adoption poses a number of challenges regardless of industry, making the mobile phone market no exception. There have been a number of attempts made to increase adoption of cryptocurrencies. This includes a helping hand from Mastercard, who have launched a new multi-currency payment card. However, it seems phone manufacturers are still not fully convinced.

Over the last decade, there has been a steady growth in the adoption and use of crypto, increasing in many different countries across the globe…

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Following in the footsteps of web; Why mobile in-app needs to embrace programmatic and header bidding

Brand Equity.com

The words India and mobile first are synonymous – in advertising lingo you almost never hear one without the other. And for good reason – consumers across India and the wider APAC region are increasingly reliant on their mobile devices – from entertainment during lockdown through casual games, catch up TV and social media, to booking taxis, checking the weather, searching for lunch bargains and paying for groceries. And the undisputed queen of Asian mobile user engagement – the mobile app. In fact the mobile app is so ubiquitous across APAC that over 75% of digital users consume all their social media, lifestyle, travel, news and utility content on apps.1

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Mobile Banking App Users Pull Ahead Of FIs On Expectations

PYMNTS

It’s been a long slog since April 2020 when a harmonic convergence of bad financial news and a worsening global health crisis formed the “crater” of the pandemic. April was also the month that financial institutions (FIs) and Big Tech firms alike learned that mobile banking had become a much bigger, more important channel, virtually overnight.

It took crashing the websites of a string of major banks and credit unions for the sector to grasp what happened. It was the stimulus checks. Almost as one, tens of millions of Americans logged onto desktop sites and mobile banking apps to see if they’d gotten their stimulus.

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Ad fraud follows APAC mobile gaming boom

WARC

Fraud rates for the gaming vertical have spiked, according to data from app marketing platform Adjust. Globally, fraudulent activity in gaming increased by 172.95% between August 2019 and 2020. In APAC this went up by 214.86%,  EMEA by 181.20% and in the US by 310.29%.

The company also reported that mobile ad fraud is rising overall, putting marketing data at risk of distortion when used for business decisions.

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MEF