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Near Field Communication and all contactless technology

The Ministry of Information Technology and Industry is looking to rally its nascent mobile payment industry around a single technology standard with the hope of cashing in on the world's largest mobile population. (TMCnet)

Consumers Union, the nonprofit publisher behind Consumer Reports magazine, is calling on federal regulators to take measures guaranteeing that existing consumer protections are applied to new mobile payment solutions. (FierceMobileContent)

A deal between loyalty-scheme operator Zapa Technology and Ireland’s largest merchant acquirer, AIB Merchant Services, could see Zapa’s contactless stickers rolled out more widely in Ireland and also gain a foothold in the United Kingdom.

Major U.S. mobile carriers planning to launch an NFC-based payment service have been ramping up hiring and are preparing to order NFC phones, but are still looking for a CEO, sources told NFC Times.

U.S mobile carriers Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile USA hope to launch precommercial trials of their planned mobile-payment service in the third quarter of 2011, sources told NFC Times.

Hong Kong's Octopus Holdings has admitted to selling its customers' personal information since January 2006 and pocketing HK$44 million (US$5.7 million) from doing so. (ZDNet Asia)

UK-based NFC technology company Innovision announced today its CEO, David Wollen, has left the company, as the acquisition of Innovision by U.S.-based chip maker Broadcom moves forward.

With interest growing in NFC but few NFC phone models yet on the market, such NFC bridge technologies as contactless stickers, microSDs and SIMs with flexible antennas are attracting more and more attention from service providers and telcos.

U.S.-based mobile-payment start-up RFinity is adopting passive-contactless stickers for its payment project in and around a university campus in Idaho, changing an earlier plan to expand its pilot using contactless microSD cards.

Near Field Communication could help give retailers a new edge in the “wallet-share war” they have been losing for years to banks and their open-loop payment card brands, according to a new report from the giant National Retail Federation.

Christian Estrosi, France’s minister of industry, has confirmed government support for three to five more cities to launch NFC services in France next year, following the precommercial NFC launch in Nice this spring.

You might call it the un-NFC technology.