Evan Schuman's StorefrontBacktalk

Shoulder surfing is an unavoidable problem with smartphones in a crowd, but 14 feet away feels like enough distance to be safe from video eavesdropping. And although there are workarounds to block the attack—turn down the screen brightness or turn off the pop-up keypress confirmation that makes the iPhone's virtual keyboard so much easier to use—it's unlikely that customers will be willing to do that. Store associates, on the other hand, might want to do both those things, along with being careful to guard their screens and watch for customers who happen to be using video cameras nearby. The biggest question is whether they can be convinced to do anything.Read more...

For many retail IT execs, it's more than a little uncomfortable. Store managers are on the same side as IT. Setting up systems to see who's underperforming—and exactly how, in near-real-time—can feel, well, a little dirty. Maybe that's why so few chains are doing it—and why most of the systems offered by vendors for using RFID data aren't built for that type of visibility. "Our number-one fight with software vendors is, your software doesn't do enough," said American Apparel VP of Technology Stacey Shulman. "'Well, it's what everybody else uses.' Well, it's not enough."Read more...

If this was just another marketing survey that over-hyped its results, it would be one thing. But there's a serious issue at play here. The holiday shopping season of 2011 is going to be a crucial one in retail M-Commerce, the one where meaningful purchases start to happen and where millions of consumers will try—or consider trying—M-Commerce. And it is where they will be satisfied or dissatisfied. Even more crucially, there is a critical expectation issue at play. What will your CEO and board expect from mobile? Surveys will create the bogus impression that a huge number of mobile transactions will happen this month (the 61 percent from this survey's headline is a perfect example), and when that doesn't happen, you're going to be blamed.Read more...

Yes, that's what HP needed. But instead of offering the tablet and sled as a general-purpose in-store mobile POS, HP is positioning it largely as an add-on to HP's own POS systems. OK, that limits the market. So does the lack of a clear advantage over an iPad (HP says being Windows-based will make it "easy for retailers to integrate," though a product manager acknowledged that iPads probably work fine with most retailers' systems too). Then there's the mag-stripe reader, which can work right out of the box in unencrypted mode. Wait, isn't that exactly what retailers don't want?Read more...

With so many chains offering pharmacy services, the debates provide a glimpse into how mobile strategies can slam into privacy rules and, sometimes, technology simply can't get around that. Tim Bell is the director for pharmacy managed care and systems at the 460-store chain operating in Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia and Mississippi. Bell said the issue is that the best approach for sending a quick alert (such as "Your Prescription for Lipitor is due for renewing. Should we renew?") and accepting ("Renew") is the least secure: text messaging.Read more...

If that sounds like an afterthought, it very nearly is, even though self-checkout alone would be a big deal for most chains. What Apple is primarily trying to do is demolish the wall between stores and M-Commerce. It may not work—that 12-minute turnaround promise may just be impossible, and some of Apple's plans for prioritizing customers can collapse when things get busy. But if it does work, it may also represent Apple's demonstration of how it plans to offer mobile payments to other retailers—without either NFC or mimicking a plastic card.Read more...

The problem is that the digital wallet concept—a place where you can cram in every payment method, CRM card and discount reminder—is the same, with trivial differences in partners and technology. PayPal did showcase some differentiators—such as the ability to pay with airline miles or other points programs, in addition to changing the payment method days after the purchase has been finalized—but it also conceded that there's nothing preventing Google or ISIS (or Apple or others) from offering identical services.Read more...

The virtual store is not new. In a much publicized trial this summer, Tesco re-created almost all of the merchandise from one of its stores as a series of high-res photographs with QR codes on the walls of a South Korean subway. But the Debenhams' effort takes it farther than any other retailer. At least consumers arriving at that subway would see pictures of products and could guess what to do. In the Debenhams' trial, consumers were directed to very prominent street corners in London (Trafalgar Square), Manchester (Albert Square), Birmingham (Centenary Square), Cardiff (Cardiff Castle) and Glasgow (George Square). They then loaded a mobile app onto their phones. If the geolocation of the phones matched what the app had been programmed to look for, it would display a ghostly image of a dress.Read more...

Whether such a possibility is good or evil depends on whether you are salivating over seeing your rivals' transactions or envisioning your rivals seeing all of your transactions. Officially, none of the mobile wallet players—including Google, PayPal and ISIS—has threatened to sell peeks at your transaction receipts to your rivals, although no one is willing to rule out future revenue sources. But the smaller vendors that are offering your customers free digitization of their paper receipts—and usually an offer to also store any already-digitized receipts—are the more likely sources of this cross-merchant data.Read more...

Conventional wisdom is that consumer resistance to invasive marketing consistently softens over time with each new retail tech innovation. But the friendly shopkeeper demonstrates that's not a linear trend. And there's a school of thought that says mobile technology may break that trend, too. The potential invasiveness of mobile payments is so intense that customers might rebel and resist all privacy-infringing efforts even more—making mobile dangerously likely to blow up in retailers' faces.Read more...

The numbers on their own are somewhat of a concern, given that compliance in any group is supposed to steadily improve. That's especially true with a new entry, such as Level 3s, which start at such a relatively low level of compliance. In this instance, though, the explanation for the compliance dip might lie in a recent increase in the number of Level 3s trying to get compliant.Read more...

By now you’ve probably seen how easy it is to unlock an iPad 2 without knowing the password. Local TV news anchors are having a field day with this one, because even they can figure out how to exploit the hole Apple left in iOS5. It requires using the iPad 2’s magnetic smart cover and about five seconds of poking buttons and covering and uncovering the screen—a truly impressive security fail.

Apple has come up with a workaround (change the smart cover-related settings) and promises a patch soon, but this should still remind retail chains they need to be doing their own security in apps running on in-store mobile devices. Making sure a custom app automatically locks itself when it’s not being used will cost an associate a few extra seconds for one more password, but you really don’t want a thief to walk off with a tablet running a live application that’s connected with your payment or inventory systems. (And if your in-store iPads don’t have their own smart covers? Let’s just say that thieves tend to come prepared.)…

"At the scan, we get a certain amount of metadata as a result of the scan itself—operating system, carrier, cell tower being used, etc. We get all of that," said Scanbuy CEO Mike Wehrs. "We know what that app has scanned in the past." Indeed, Wehrs argues, the app can secure data from the QR code plus the phone plus online data accessed from a retailer's loyalty card database. "If the app integrates with their CRM files, it can give a completely customized experience."Read more...

The potential of this microlocation mobile approach is compelling, because it provides a relatively easy—and somewhat accurate—way to help customers find product. Of course, that's not the goal of all chains. Some chains—such as Costco—depend heavily on the customer stumbling on impulse buys as he/she wanders the aisles in search of the elusive clothes pins or peanuts.Read more...

Mobile-commerce sites, take note: Android phones are now outselling all other smartphones in Asia. On October 20, ABI Research reported that in 2011, Android will represent 52 percent of smartphones sold in Asian markets, up from 16 percent last year. (Combined with the 56 percent increase in Asian smartphone sales that ABI reported, that means a stunning five times as many Asian Android phones sold in 2011 as in 2010.) ABI also reported on Monday (Oct. 24) that, worldwide, downloads of Android apps now outpace those for the iPhone by 44 to 31 percent, although Apple users still download twice as many apps per phone.

That doesn’t mean iPhone use has fallen off a cliff—many of those Androids are likely lower-priced phones that are being snapped up by customers who can’t afford Apple’s price tag. But it does mean large numbers of M-Commerce customers will be using Android phones. That could actually make life easier for M-Commerce developers: With the market mainly split between spendthrift iPhone customers and more numerous cheapskate Android users, developers can decide who they want to target and how to make their mobile sites work well with either group—or both.…

There are two likely near-term impacts from the ruling. First, Hannaford itself will now have this case return to an active trial status, where it will likely reside for an absurdly short of time before it's settled for the very small number of dollars that such an insurance policy and card replacements (for just a few customers) will cost. For retailers throughout the country, though, the impact will be more muted.Read more...

There are two changes to the SIGs this year. One change is that a Council staffer will lead the SIG (previously, the chair was a member of the PCI Council's Board of Advisors). The other change is that each SIG must complete its work in one year. In years past, SIGs could—and sometimes did—run indefinitely, becoming a source of frustration for everyone. The changes should mean each SIG is focused on delivering results. Read more...

The vendor behind the trial, a U.K. firm called Path Intelligence, pledged that "no mobile phone usernames or numbers could be accessed" and that "all we do is log the movement of a phone around an area and aggregate this to provide trend data for businesses." But what if that phone-tracking data is linked with security cameras and/or POS systems? What if a mall representative called one of its retail residents and said, "We're now tracking a woman who has spent $980 in the last hour and she has just walked into your store. For a $300 fee, I'll tell you exactly where she's standing right now. Deal?"Read more...

The guidelines, which are generally filled with commonsense security restrictions, offer nothing about timing, schedules or when retailers can—or should—include the new requirements in RFPs. The closest the guidelines get to referencing existing hardware is a brief comment that such components can be reused in newly approved systems. It does, however, detail fees.Read more...

Sears' conservative move makes more sense in the context that many customers may not feel like using their phones while shopping and, more to the point, most American consumers don't yet have smartphones—if you accept the smartphone definition of a phone that can download third-party apps.Read more...

For example: Where should the QR codes be placed? Should it be near the bottom of the screen? Well, what if the consumer time-shifts with a DVR or Tivo? A part of the code could be overridden by screen buttons. Place it in a glossy magazine? Good choice, but you have to steer clear of the page side toward any glued (perfect-bound) gutter or else consumers won't be able to get a full scan of the image.Read more...

It's a classic single-point-of-failure problem, and it could be frighteningly disruptive—especially since this holiday season will be the first at many stores with lots of in-store mobile devices in use, and almost all retailers are using Wi-Fi to keep them connected. A saboteur who uses a pocket-size jammer wouldn't have access to payment-card information, but what's supposed to be an impressive demonstration of retail technology would just irritate customers and frustrate associates—especially during the high-volume times that mobile POS should be a relief. And that's just from an intentional saboteur. Unintentional Wi-Fi jamming could have even worse effects.Read more...

The new service, called Refill Reminder Text Alerts, is based on a top-notch idea. The goal is to aid customers who have multiple refills and have had the onus of initiating contact with their pharmacy every time a prescription needs to be refilled, even if they have been consistently refilling the same prescriptions every month for years. Instead of waiting for the customer to call, the chain is initiating that contact and asking with a simple text for permission to refill the order. The problem involves restrictions from the U.S. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). It prevents the texts from identifying which prescription it's asking about.Read more...

There are lots of reasons for that: IT shops have bad memories of having to run proprietary RIM servers to support BlackBerry users. RIM's periodic network outages (such as the one slowing E-mail delivery and choking BlackBerry Internet access this week) give retail IT plenty of reason to hope payments will never depend on RIM. And although iPhones are sexy and Android phones are at least gadgety, BlackBerrys—until recently—looked downright clunky. But with a growing consumer fan base spearheaded by BlackBerry Messenger users, along with actual experience doing mobile payments, retailers may have to bite the bullet and accept that RIM is going to be a payments player in the U.S., too. The question is, how soon—and then how?Read more...

Retailers are starting to outrun Google when it comes to Google Wallet. On Tuesday (Oct. 11), the $334 million Peet’s Coffee chain announced that, by the end of October, it will upgrade POS devices to accept Google Wallet payments at all 193 company-owned stores—not just the ones in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco and Washington, D.C., where Google Wallet was officially rolled out in late September. Peet’s is working fast—American Eagle Outfitters didn’t even officially launch Google Wallet in the target cities until Wednesday (Oct. 12), although AEO actually had it working in some stores a month ago.

If Google was hoping for an orderly Wallet rollout, it may be out of luck. There’s only so long the window will stay open for retailers to look cool by offering mobile payments—once customers get used to it, Google Wallet will be more useful but not nearly so interesting. That means at least some smaller retailers may be in a race to get Google Wallet running in as many locations as possible, never mind Google’s plans. And once retailers, not Google, are calling the shots on the mobile-payments rollout, that’s control that Google may never recapture.…