The design and development of a secure m-commerce business over global system for mobile communications (gsm)

Thesis Overview

<p> </p><p><strong>INTRODUCTION</strong></p><p><strong>1.1 &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; BACKGROUND<br>OF THE STUDY</strong></p><p>Rarely has a new<br>area of business been heralded with such enthusiasm as “mobile commerce”, that<br>is the conduct of business and services over portable, wireless devices. Due to<br>the astronomical growth of the internet users, maturation of the internet<br>technologies, realization of the internet’s capabilities, the power of<br>electronic commerce, and the promising advancement of wireless communication<br>technologies and devices, mobile commerce has rapidly attained the business<br>fore – front. M-commerce, although not fully mature, has the potential to make<br>it more convenient for customers to spend money and purchase, goods and<br>services. Since wireless devices travel with the consumer, the ability or<br>perhaps temptation to purchase goods and services is always present. This is<br>clearly a technique that can be used to raise revenue. Also the successful<br>future of m-commerce depends on the power of the underlying technology drivers<br>and the attractiveness of m-commerce applications.</p><p>M-commerce is an<br>e-commerce with wireless access. E- Commerce is the subset of M-commerce. If<br>one wants to operate an M-commerce site, one should make arrangement to<br>facilitate exchange of goods and services via the site. In this regard, buyers<br>or customers could:</p><ul><li>View the goods and services available.</li><li>Purchase any point if goods and services<br>using the shopping cart. Shopping cart is the electronic site like software<br>that will pick anything you buy from the shop to shopping business.</li><li>One should have a means of making payment<br>for goods and services selected for purchase. Typically a number of payment<br>systems are displayed or provided and the user selects the one of most interest<br>to him or her.</li></ul><p>Furthermore, each<br>payment system can operate by entirely different </p><p>Independent body and<br>not necessary by own M-commerce exchange. Adequately arrangements are however<br>made between the owner M-commerce exchange, the owners of goods and services<br>market through the exchange and payment services providers. Ideally, it is the<br>owner of the M-commerce exchange that should negotiate with each of payment<br>service providers and (as a separate process) negotiate with goods and services<br>provider. </p><ol><li><strong>OPERATION<br>FEATURES OF M-COMMERCE</strong></li><li>Anyone<br>who has goods and services to market contact the M-commerce, to be included in<br>the online database of the M-commerce exchange.</li><li>If<br>there is an approval after processing the online form the goods and services<br>providers is requested to provide information about goods and services and load<br>it to the M-commerce site. Such information include name of each items, item<br>code, brief description, unit cost, delivery items, quality discount and any<br>other information the M-commerce exchange may deem necessary.</li></ol><p>It is responsibility of the<br>M-commerce exchange designs to providers a home page featuring a broad<br>classification of goods and services offering. As the user clicks on a choice<br>another page of tittles would come up to reappear the user to see the<br>particular item of interest.</p><p>Before<br>negotiating through the available goods and services a user should be requested<br>to choose whether he or she want to view or purchase the item of interest a<br>shopping business would be deployed were item selected by the user replace<br>along with the individual cost and cumulative cost. When the user indicates<br>that he has finish selection, the payment option are them displayed so the user<br>can select a mean of payment.</p><p>The payment system operates on the<br>total cost of the item in the shopping chart and handles all aspect of security<br>for such online payment. Depending on the arrangement made by the M-commerce<br>exchange operators each online payment system provider would credit the amount<br>of online exchange operators with the payment made by the buyer less the agreed<br>commission due to payment system provider.</p><p>In the context<br>of M-commerce, the normal expectation is that the M-commerce exchange can be<br>accessed via handheld or portable devices from anywhere in the world where<br>there is internet connectivity and at any time of the day, all year round. One<br>major advantage of M-commerce exchange concept explained above is that anyone<br>who decides to use the exchange need not know anything about the internet but<br>can have goods and services are marketed via the M-commerce exchange web sites.<br>Furthermore, anyone (middle men) without their own goods and services can<br>arrange to sell other people’s goods and services via the site. This creates job opportunity for many without<br>transferring the responsibility of internet on online marketing directly to<br>them.</p><p>E-commerce (electronic<br>commerce) can be defined as the mutual exchange of perceived or monetary value<br>by electronic means over open accessible networks. This basically means<br>communication over the internet for some or all of the transaction processes<br>(ARC Group 2000).</p><p>M- Commerce<br>(M-commerce) can be defined as any transaction with added value for the user,<br>which is carried out by means of mobile/wireless device or infrastructure (ARC<br>Group 2000).</p><p>M-finance<br>(m-finance) is a subset of M-commerce that offers a range of banking share<br>dealing and insurance services (ARC group 2000). With the coming of advanced and sophisticated<br>services, mobile communications combined with e-commerce proportions are<br>heightening the attractiveness of M-commerce. The key drivers of this are.</p><ul><li>Ubiquity: The anytime anywhere”<br>advantage of M-commerce (ARC group 2000). Smart phone may fulfit the need for<br>both real time information and communication, independent of the user’s<br>physical location (Miiller-veerse, 2000).</li><li>Reachability: Using a mobile terminal, a<br>user can be contacted anywhere anytime. Mobile handsets also provide users the<br>ability to restrict their reachability to certain people (Miiller-Veerse,<br>2000).</li><li>Personalization: Handsets are effective<br>personal accessories that are capable to holding data and enabling access to<br>information and services tailored to the needs of each individual (ARC group<br>2000).</li><li>Localization: Nothing where the user is<br>and providing information relating to that location adds a unique value to<br>mobile services.</li><li>Convenience: Mobile subscribes have become accustomed to<br>their devices that store data and are always at hand. More advanced<br>applications are driven by technology further enabling the mobile subscriber.</li><li>Convergence: Technological applications<br>can be decoyed on the move. This is blurring the divide between mobile phones<br>and PCs. Even increasing sophistication and functionality sustains further<br>handset development.</li><li>&nbsp;Internet Access: Instant connectivity to the<br>internet from a mobile device is fast becoming a reality and will take off with<br>the introduction of GPRD. This suggested that mobile devices will become the<br>preferred means of accessing information on the internet.</li></ul><p>However there are also several factors that may slow<br>or constrain the progress of M-commerce. These inhibitors include the<br>following.</p><ul><li>Security: The public has serious concerns about the security of the internet. This has been s major constraint to consumer e-commerce. This negative perception may be transferred, or potentially magnified to the mobile arena (AGC group 2000).</li><li>Interoperability: Due to the range of handset functionalities and operating systems, there are inherent costs associated with delivering a range of services. This may determine some content providers from making the investment and carrying the overheads associated with such a service.</li><li>Usability: The internet provides rich content via the large screens and multimedia capabilities of PCs. The constraints imposed on the mobile handset might limit its appeal to users (ARC group 2000).</li></ul> <br><p></p>