I have a Nexus 5 with a long boot time encryption password and a shorter unlock pin. Seems it was already fixed.

To what data are you referring? Google holds keys for some stuff like email, which is sent in plaintext anyway and which they need to offer webmail access. They claim not to have the keys to synced browser data though, and apart from some innuendo and "of course they do" you offer no evidence to the contrary.

Unlike Apple, Google can't recover your backups if you are completely locked out of your account and don't know the password. That suggests that they really don't have the key.

Besides which, local encryption on your phone is designed to frustrate thrives and other people trying to rape your phone like the police. It also makes wiping easy and effective when you want to sell it.

The language is very specific. Maybe they didn't get a request for bulk data, maybe they just had to provide a back door into everything so that law enforcement could serve itself. Then again, maybe not, we have no way of knowing, which makes all American company's claims that they resist the government worthless.

I guess you have not seen how people swipe through the gates at stations. It certainly would be more hassle so I can see people sticking with their NFC cards for the daily commute. Does it work even if the phone is locked?

Google Translate, or Bing if you are desperate.

Really? Are you saying that the phone needs to be unlocked before it can be used to make a payment? Sounds incredibly inconvenient.

With current phone payment systems there is no need to unlock the phone or open an app before using them, you just touch the phone to the payment terminal with the screen off and it pays. It would be annoying when trying to use the phone during busy periods to get on public transport or pay for stuff at the station otherwise.

Before someone screams that it's insecure, NFC debit/credit cards don't need to be "unlocked" either. The payment limit is so low that the banks just eat the losses which are more than made up for by you using NFC instead of cash all the time, and any thief will be more interested in the phone itself.

Well, Apple Pay isn't available anywhere in the world yet, so Google is still ahead.

I agree, Apple screwed up there. Good job Google's system works with existing terminals.

More recent stats: http://bcnranking.jp/news/1408...

Why pick stats from one particular month instead of the latest ones?

Also note that the iPhone has few models, where as sales for other manufacturers are spread over many more different ones. According to those stats over 70% of phones sold are not iPhones, and that's despite the extremely heavy promotion.

I use it with a sleep monitor to read back data. Many other health devices use it. It's better than Bluetooth for things that don't need real time monitoring because it's much lower power. My sleep monitor supports the iPhone but the battery lasts a few days instead of a few weeks if you have one.

That's not how NFC payments work. The transport layer is untrusted, the same as when you talk to your bank over TCP/IP. Apps couldn't steal credit card info if they wanted to, it's a one time challenge/response per transaction.

Either the API isn't ready or Apple just doesn't want to share so it can release its own apps first. Security is not an issue.

The iPhone is popular here but I wouldn't say as popular as it used to be, or is in other countries. I remember them putting out rope barriers for the 5s launch and hardly anyone turned up at Yodobashi in Akiba. Right now interest in the iPhone 6 doesn't seem that high either. There are too many good rival phones.

Actually, it might be a technical limitation too. NFC apps need to run in the background and use secure hardware, and they probably don't have an API yet.

Nonsense. Google already has agreements in place and terminals deployed. It works, people use it, it has taken off. I find it extremely easy and useful.

The reason Apple locked NFC down has nothing to do with payments. They could just ban any payment apps while allowing things like file/data transfers, authentication etc. They must be planning to do their own versions of those apps soon and don't want to be accused of cloning other people's work as happened in the past.

That's rather pessimistic. Just because an environment is harsh we don't give up, we overcome the problems.

You wouldn't need anything like a 1TWh. All you need is enough to smooth output of an intermittent source a bit and give you s little longer to ramp up other energy sources. On Japan a 250MW wind farm gets a 40MWh battery for smoothing.