Sunday 24 April 2016

NFC - Near Field Communication - wireless power at your fingertips !!

Few years from now your credit cards, bus pass, train tickets, loyalty cards for high street coffee shops will be gone due to digital transformation and you only carry your phone.

Welcome to Near Field Communications (NFC), a contact less, WiFi style technology that could already be in your smartphone, and could soon be a regular feature of your commute.

Near field communication (NFC) is a radio wave technology for smartphones and similar devices which allows to establish communication with each other by touching them together or bringing them into close proximity, usually no more than a few centimeters.

Unlike Bluetooth, no pairing code is needed, and because it's very low power, no battery in the device being read.

NFC allows for data exchange between 2 devices like your smartphone & payment device through physical contact.

Today many of your tasks can be done by NFC:
  • Instant mobile payments at POS
  • Data sharing of contacts, photos, files within friends
  • Commuting tickets like bus pass, train tickets and just wave to enter

Some futuristic uses of NFC:
  • Rental firms can send you keys via email and you can wave the keys above car lock and voila…..you are off !!
  • No forms at the hospitals, just wave your mobile and doctor gets your medical records
  • Tourists can tap the NFC tags at the historical monuments and learn more
  • NFC enables smart posters offers coupons, discounts or timetables for next ride
  • NFC pass to board the plane instead of normal boarding pass
  • Open your hotel or office doors with tap of an NFC wearable device


Google Wallet was NFC's biggest push on 2011 allowing US Android users to pay using NFC technology.

Apple Pay released in October 2014, allowing iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus users to pay using NFC at participating retailers.

Today Samsung, PayPal all are entering this market.

NFC is further used in tags which are small stickers that contain NFC chip and based on programming it can change various settings, launch apps and perform some actions just by holding your phone near to it.

Are you still diving your old '96 Honda Civic's but want to treat it as Tesla? Just slap a NFC tag on dashboard and program it to turn on Bluetooth, GPS and 3G, open Google Maps, and whatever else you need on your smartphone. Then show off to your dear ones J

NFC is still in its trial phase, but it's got a big future.

3 comments:

  1. During Last decade the use of RFID was popular in Germany as a patient identification card. This was used for speeding up doctor appointments and providing special assistance for senior citizens/specially abled persons without calling out for help at the hospitals.With the popularity of NFC the segment of personalization in medical care seems to be at a close distance.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Good post....thanks for sharing.. very useful for me i will bookmark this for my future needs. Thanks.


    Pass Box manufacturers

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thanks for sharing info on NFC, Sandeep

    ReplyDelete

360TotalSecurity WW