Tomorrow's the big day when we get to decide our future and pick the people to lead us through the next few years. That's the theory at least.

In reality, I imagine many of us are overwhelmed by the big issues such as the economy and environment and hope that those who we delegate power to have some notion as to how to steer us through what looks like difficult times next year and onwards.

One thing that angers me is how much time and effort has been spent on issues not included in the parties' manifestos and campaigns over the past years. I am thinking of important matters such as shifting the balance of power around intellectual property rights to overseas corporations and strange "free trade agreements" that cost the country in benefits and jobs.

I'm pretty sure that the electorate in general didn't ask for that to happen. Had they been told that the parties they were about to vote for would push through policies that'll hurt businesses and people on behest of overseas interests… well, the election before this one might have ended differently and maybe this year's too.

As it is, you have to become skilled in reading between the lines when looking at the different parties' policies.

Either way, if I don't vote, I don't get to whine about politicians. Saturday, here I come.

Mobile money menace

Personal and business money matters and technology are becoming increasingly intermingled. As an example, I haven't had a chequebook for years now; the last cheque I deposited was over a year ago. The vast majority of my transactions take place via EFTPOS, the Internet and… my smartphone. Cash? Still use it, but often not for weeks on end. As an aside, I know there's a big cash economy out there for anonymous transactions but we're getting closer to the stage when coins and notes will be a thing of the past.

Banks and other money-handlers are keen on this transformation, as it provides some huge benefits for them. The minute cost and "weightlessness" of digital transactions mean they can be processed in massive volumes compared to cash and cheques, while earning often-comparable fees.

Financial institutions don't however have a guaranteed monopoly on digital transactions. Dwolla for instance looks like it'll take off, thanks to credit card companies charging some pretty outrageous fees for transactions that cost not a whole lot to process.

It's about reach and convenience: I would imagine that if Google got its act together, it could become the biggest "Internet bank" in the world very quickly.

There is one area though where banks and others could get really close to you and tie you up to their particular form of digital payments processing: your smartphone.

At any given time the 21^st century person usually carries three items on her: some form of keys, a wallet and a mobile phone. The first two can in fact be folded into the last one using technology such as Near Field Communications.

What's holding back the banks isn't so much the technology to facilitate mobile financial transactions, but security. The same convenience and ability to process huge volumes of transactions rapidly attracts the baddies too: why stick a gun into a teller's face and run off with twenty grand, when you can concoct mobile malware that people will not only download and install voluntarily, but which will spread like wildfire and often operate unnoticed, potentially bringing in millions?

Unfortunately I think it'll be impossible to sort out that problem. User education and security have proven to be only moderately successful with cash and cheque transactions over the centuries; fraud hasn't gone away for traditional money handling.

Even though technology can step into the breach and monitor things like unusual transaction patterns to prevent criminal use far more rapidly than humans could, it will also be used to get through security. This is an ongoing war, with battles being won and lost on both sides.

The spoils of the battles are quite incredible though: before getting caught and receiving a twenty-year prison sentence, Albert "soupnazi" Gonzalez got hold of and resold over 170 million credit card and ATM numbers.

It's not just the out and out criminals that banks have to worry about though. The manufacturers of the handsets - or hi-tech wallets if you like - come up with some pretty dodgy stuff, often with good intentions.

Yes, invisible rootkits on mobiles. If you're the head security geek at a bank, the thought of Carrier-IQ and mobile transactions should you make you just a tiny bit queasy.

On yer bike

These two clips are subtle yet self-explanatory. Brilliant, and thanks to Brett Roberts of the Auckland NZCS branch for finding them.

That's it for today. Don't forget to do your thing tomorrow.

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Contributed content is the opinion of the author only, and not necessarily the view of NZCS.

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