Present and Future of Mobile Commerce

Mobile Commerce is a term to describe any commercial activity on a mobile device, such as a mobile phone (iPhone, Android, Blackberry) or a tablet (iPad, Galaxy Tab, Surface). This includes all steps of the customer journey; reach, attract, choose, convert and retain. Hence mobile commerce is probably best described as shopping that takes advantage of unique properties of mobile devices. It is also called as m-commerce. Pervasive computing aims at availability and invisibility. On the one hand, pervasive computing can be defined as availability of software applications and information anywhere and anytime. On the other hand, pervasive computing also means that computers are hidden in numerous so-called information appliances that we use in our day-to-day lives Characteristics of pervasive computing applications have been identified as interaction transparency, context awareness, and automated capture of experiences.

Exploring Barriers Affecting the Acceptance of Mobile Commerce

With the continuous increase in numbers of users of mobile devices, the adoption of M-commerce is still far from reaching its full potential. There are various barriers that hinder the proliferation of m-commerce such as mobile devices inefficiency, lack of consumer's trust, incompatible networks, poor network coverage, limited bandwidth, low speed, lack of security & privacy, high cost of handsets and cost of establishing the necessary wireless infrastructure and lack of awareness. Perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use and gender differences were other influential factors in m-commerce. Recently, Mobile Payment (m-payment) is a promising and exciting domain that has been rapidly developing. However, Consumer adoption of mobile payment (m-payment) solutions is low compared to the acceptance of traditional forms of payments. The chapter discusses these above m-commerce's barriers in details.

Analysing Architecture and Transaction Model in Securing Mobile Commerce

Mobile communication is becoming one of the most popular and high growth area in recent times, credit for this rapid growth goes to new research and inventions in all areas of mobile and wireless technology. Use of 3G is growing rapidly; on the other hand, 4G lead the way for next generation of mobile communication. This chapter describes the Mobile Architecture Layers and flow of transactions and shows comparison between Existing Transaction models. Threats and Risks associated with mobile transactions are primary concern along with the security techniques on various payment modes. Database security is also a part of the discussion of this chapter.

Regulatory Framework of Mobile Commerce

Mobile commerce has given a new definition to wireless payment methods. It is new emerging technique which requires security at the top priority. Users are not still confident in using this technology. The proper infrastructure and support from government is required to deal with mobile commerce which can be achieved by developing fundamental regulatory framework. Regulatory framework described the technological and legal regulations to ensure the security in transaction in mobile commerce. It helps to deal with security related problem, financial issues and other legal issues that cause a hurdle in making mobile payment. A clearly defined regulatory framework is also required to enhance the customers' confidence and increase acceptance of mobile payment in their daily life. The cooperation and information sharing between telecommunication regulator, mobile service provider, and mobile operator and banking regulator is required to make a successful and efficient working regulatory framework.

Attracting Customers' to Online Shopping Using Mobile Apps

The chapter will try to take a systematic and holistic approach to the M-Commerce trust discussing complete issues of trust in E-Commerce from the customer's perspective. It will mainly focus on understanding trust and the elements of M-Commerce trust prevalent in the Indian society. The study will focus on identifying the trust factors pertaining to B2C E-Commerce websites/mobile applications from the perspective of Indian customers. The chapter will primarily discuss a case study of Indian market to explain what trust factors influence the consumers to buy online. The present case study is an in-depth examination of the customers' situation in their daily practice of online shopping. It highlights several valuable lessons concerning the evaluation of B2C E-Commerce investment and ways of enhancing the customers' trust in the e-vendor, thereby increasing the e-vendors' sales along with the ease of the customers. The study is based on the responses collated from personal interviews, questionnaires and experts' judgements.

Security Risks of Mobile Commerce

Mobile commerce (m-commerce) is evolving as an alternative to E-commerce services. M-commerce is a type of e-commerce which emphases on the use of services on handheld devices. It is becoming very popular among users because of ease of connectivity and its usage. With increase in the demand, it becomes essential to provide security to the services used on mobile. The user is using the mobile devices to make their secure payments and transactions. It becomes essential to increase security layers in the m-commerce to provide privacy to the user. The security risks in m-commerce are increasing exponentially. This chapter investigates the security breaches and the solutions associated with the m-commerce. It also focuses on the network services and problem related with device and user authentication. Many algorithms are proposed to make the device and the transaction safe. It is compulsory to make m-payment method very safe and secure, so that user can trust m-commerce to use their sensitive personal information.

Services of Mobile Commerce

Mobile phones have been coined by Martin Cooper with a thought of staying connected anytime anywhere. With the development of mobile phones in 1973 and its commercialization later; has proliferated not only the big business houses but also small businesses and individuals. Mobile phones have come a long way from talking on a mobile phone, texting a message to efficiently using internet. These days mobile commerce is the booming technology which has enhanced industries visibility and the way of conducting business. The customers are getting benefited by using these Apps they can shop anytime, anywhere; they get good discounts, companies are offering good return policies for better CRM and above all the customers have a provision to compare the cost before ordering and can pay COD. The study will focus on the concept of mobile phone, mobile commerce, characteristics of M-Commerce, Drivers affecting the mobile commerce, various services offered on mobile. The chapter focuses on potential of mobile commerce, how the customer is benefited from these services.

Consumer Perception to Mobile Commerce

Consumers' perception and opinion about mobile commerce activities play a very important role in their success. Industry people should understand consumers' worries, fears and phobias Slow connections, privacy and threat of government regulation has played an important role in limiting the growth of mobile commerce. Lack of information about mobile commerce is also one of the biggest problems being faced by the industry people. Moreover, most consumers are not totally convinced about buying something from their mobile devices as they do not consider it a satisfactory experience. Sticking to the traditional ways of shopping is another major factor in the slow growth of mobile commerce. Mobile customers have raised expectations in terms of service, convenience, speed of delivery. The difficult tasks for m-commerce is to ensure consumers' trust by making them feel comfortable with wireless transactions. It is important to find solutions to their consumer problems and serve them better than the competitors and provide them with relevant incentives to keep them coming back again.

Mobile Commerce Security and Its Prevention

Mobile commerce is the next generation of e-commerce, where payments and financial transactions can be carried out with utmost ease using handheld mobile devices. Mobile devices are at a higher security risk due to the large amount of critical financial and personal data available on it. The cause or consequence of these threats could be - malware and spyware attacks ; multiple or incorrect m-Commerce payments; breaches due to unauthorized access or disclosure, unauthenticated transactions and risk due to the use of third party networks. This chapter discusses how to manage security risks in m-commerce by first identifying them and then discussing preventive measures for their mitigation. A continuous approach for risk prevention needs to be followed, reviewing the strategy according to the latest challenges. Various risk prevention and mitigation strategies can be adopted. Service providers must follow physical and digital security measures to protect consumer's business information. Independent auditing should ensure compliance with best practice security standards.

Mobile Services Behavioral Intention

This chapter presents a review of literature concerning behavioral intention theory and research models, focusing on the factors driving consumer adoption intention of mobile services. Based on this theoretical background a conceptual framework that combines perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, innovativeness, trust, demographic characteristics and relationship drivers in order to examine their influence on the mobile services' adoption intention has been proposed. Furthermore, the proposed framework is empirically tested using data collected from a survey in Greece. The collected data are analyzed through factor analysis, stepwise regression analysis and ANOVAs. According to the results of the study, individuals' innovativeness, their educational level, and the relationship ties between the users and the mobile services are key factors to encourage m-services' adoption. The outcomes provide interesting insights and useful hints to practitioners and researchers.