NEAR FIELD COMMUNICATION
Near Field Communication is an immerging technology in the field of wireless industry. NFC technology can be used in billing counters, buses, or sharing information to friends. It can be used by swapping the smart phone over NFC enabled device such as a NFC tag which has information stored in it. For example instead of swiping credit card in the card reader at any shop we can just simply take out phone from our pocket and wave it over the NFC enabled reader and credit card information will be transferred to the bank. HISTORY OF NFC
NFC is not an innovation basically but an advance version of other short range wireless technologies like RFID. NFC forum was created to define the standards of NFC and facilitate it for further growth. NFC forum was founded in year 2004 in collaboration by Sony, Nokia and Philips. It define some standards which has to be followed by the NFC enabled devices and smartphones. The forum also ensures the inter compatibility of the NFC devices, which means that any NFC device can communicate with any other NFC device which provides a simple and fast way to transfer data and therefore it doesn’t restrict users to a few devices. Currently some companies have started using NFC technology such as Google and PayPal and this will encourage users to try this new technology. NFC is focusing on United States and is ready to establish itself as simple, contactless payment system. HOW IT WORKS
NFC work on the basic theory of RFID tags. It uses a loosely coupled inductive circuit to exchange power and data over a short distance. Radio waves are used to send signals between devices which are kept within the distance of 4cm from each other. A smartphone will send out a signal to a NFC tag installed inside a movie poster or a card reader and interact with it. The phone and tag communicate back and forth to send information or complete a transaction. NFC works in three modes which is reader/writer mode, peer to peer mode and card emulation mode. In reader/writer mode the information is embedded on the integrated circuit of the tag which connects to an antenna. In peer to peer mode two NFC enabled devices share information with each other and in card emulation mode a NFC device like smartphones, it work as a credit/debit card or a transportation card. USES AND BENEFITS OF NFC
One of major use of the NFC technology is that it can be used to do purchase while shopping. Moreover it can be used in the transportation like buses where the tags can be installed into public transit payment system. So instead of swiping and putting money into the machine a user can simply wave the phone over reader and get a ticket. NFC can be used in media industries like a NFC enabled poster can be put on the streets and let public scan it on their smart phones for information about the posters. Social media can also become the one of the major beneficiary of this technology. There is plenty of development going on NFC based applications. In NFC forum competition, some students from German university submitted a prototype which integrates with Facebook and it allowed people who met physically to exchange their profile data through their phone. Instead of searching a new acquaintance's profile after a party, this application provides an option to directly connect to each other.
With NFC technology in place no need to carry multiple credit cards or search the right credit card for payment. No more lost ticket or passes and moreover no individual rewards cards from different stores to track. Instead simply load rewards cards on the phone and go straight to your account without ever searching out for card. It provides versatility for the user. Customer can do various things from NFC like checkout at the store, load