It's hard to get people excited about computer chips. Unless you're talking to computer gamers or similarly obsessive technical types, most people immediately start to go to sleep when you start talking about technical specifics. However, the Near Field Communication chip is truly revolutionary, and customers and organizations alike should prepare to be dazzled by our new, near-communicating future. From toys to payments to train passes, there are many uses for this technology that will only continue to grow as more organizations begin to understand how big – and important of a switch it is.
Credit cards and security
By far the most common application of the NFC chip will be its use with Apple Pay and similar services that allow users to purchase things using their phones, according to Digital Trends. Many credit cards, as well, will use similar technology in order to connect with the corresponding readers many retailers are rolling out. The adoption of this sort of device will have wide-ranging security implications for the better. It is commonly known, thanks to the cumulative effect of the Target and Home Depot breaches, that credit cards have information that is fairly easy to steal – almost anyone with a magnetic reader can simply take an enormous amount of data off of a credit card. Mobile devices are already being used to pay for good in a variety of areas, which signals that this technology is already achieving a level of acceptance.
Toys and games
NFC has other uses, as well. The popular Disney Infinity miniatures, Skylanders figurines and Nintendo Amiibos all use NFC chips in order to communicate with the Wii U console. This allows these toys to unlock in-game content in the form of the character figurine, according to Trusted Reviews. The gradual merging of physical and digital toys for kids points toward a direction in which the difference between these two types of products is blurred. How long will it be before kids are begging their parents to buy digital play sets for their games? These three types of miniatures have already achieved a wide range of appeal, with Amiibos being one of the few toys that has buoyed Nintendo's sagging sales in the last year.
Train passes and civic use
"NFC is coming to toys, trains, and transactions near you."
Ventra, the company that issues passes for the Chicago Transit Authority, recently released an app that allows users to pay their fare using their cell phone's innate NFC capabilities. This is just the beginning of the use of mobile devices to fill an increasingly large role in the public sphere. Today's igital train passes might become tomorrow's driver's licenses. With the ability to store personal data securely within the super-convenient format of a cell phone, cards may disappear altogether.
NFC is coming to toys, trains, and transactions near you. The beginning of this technology is people being able to send data to devices fairly quickly, but what happens when it experiences mass-adoption? Are we nearing the end of the plastic credit cards? How will people find images for their e-commerce articles without credit card stock photos? These questions, will be answered as NFC becomes more popular.
