
Her iPhone died. It led to her being charged as a criminal - scotteh
https://www.zdnet.com/article/her-iphone-died-it-led-to-her-being-charged-as-a-criminal/
======
zaroth
You know what irks me? Besides the fact that the fine for not paying is
atrociously high, besides the fact that such a transgression can even show up
on a Visa query, besides the fact that this couldn’t be resolved without a
court, besides the fact that the reporter missed their court date...

What irks me is that some company spent millions of taxpayer dollars designing
this contactless payment system and couldn’t be bothered to provide a real-
time readout to the ticket inspector where the passenger could just provide
their name to confirm they paid.

But even more than _that_ , I irks me that TFA came away from this experience
hating Apple Pay. This singular component in the entire chain which was
completely blameless.

~~~
htfu
In my reading that's how it would've worked if she'd registered, am I off? Not
sure how it'd be possible so sort out on the spot without that.

But of course ridiculous that it took such hoops to fix after the fact.

~~~
dv_dt
I find it ridiculous that the payment was accepted if the requirement was that
the source of payment needed to be registered and that somehow, if you had the
app or phone on you, that is valid without registration of the source, but if
later you're trying to avoid a fine that payment isn't valid without
registration.

~~~
nabdab
Think of it this way. If you buy a ticket you can show the ticket and it’s
valid even though you never provide proof of identity, and the person checking
is just verifying that the human entity in front of them have a piece of
cardboard. No problem there. Buying a ticket with Apple pay just puts the
“cardboard ticket” in your phone.

Now you could also buy a monthly travel card, and register it to your
identity, which is great because now if you forget the card, but can prove
your identity then no problem, since they have the records.

The issue here is that she has a non-identified cardboard ticket on her dead
phone. Which doesn’t enjoy the benefit of being tied to her Identity.

Apple pay isn’t really any different from the coins4cardboard tech here. If
you buy a cardboard ticket with a credit card and throw it away, then you
can’t show bank statements to get out of a fine. The expectation of the
cardboard ticket is that you keep it on you to prove you have it. If that had
been the case and she’s dropped a ticket out the pocket of her coat, would
they be blaming the coat brand?

~~~
dv_dt
Except for the fact it wasn't a paper ticket, it was an electronic ticket
which likely has all sorts of records and metadata connected to it as well as
being verifiable via a server - which would be needed anyway otherwise they
have likely a huge electronically generated counterfeit or an accounting
problem.

I'm guessing if the police wanted to check an alibi of an individual claiming
to have taken the train at some point that the records of that electronic
ticket would be dug up.

------
elipsey
I think this is a systems design problem in the category of failing to include
a functional system/business method for reversing an invalid record, i.e., an
incorrect record of non-payment.

SF Muni also has a phone payment app, but even most people who don’t use it do
not have a physical receipt. If for any reason the Muni inspector can’t scan
your BART/Clippper card there needs to be a reasonable way to use other proof
of payment to correct an erroneous record of non-payment. This is the same
situation as if one's phone died after using Apple pay to get on the bus.

The failure to create system methods/business methods that allow for
reasonable correction of erroneous records is unethical, but unfortunately
common. Think of: cleaning up after “identity theft”, or trying to get removed
from the the no-fly list. I privately think of this as a 27b/6 error.

------
milankragujevic
Eh. In Easter Europe passengers beat up inspectors.

Also, it's illegal not to have an ID with you at all times. So people usually
carry wallets. I carry cash all the time. Better to get robbed (small chance)
than get stuck somewhere without money (i.e. CC doesn't work because the bank
is having "software issues" or the POS terminal is broken or whatever...)

~~~
gnode
This isn't about being caught without cash. Whenever I've gone to London I've
used my contactless credit card to pay for transport, not because I don't
carry cash, but because it's convenient -- you just hold it near the gate and
go through; no need to visit a ticket machine.

A problem with this convenience is that you don't get any kind of physical
receipt to prove you paid. Perhaps in my case, a ticket inspector could scan
my credit card to check it was used to pay, but in the case of a dead phone,
it can't be queried.

~~~
milankragujevic
It helps to have cards that are bought and topped up online, that last for a
month and cost 10€ and you can ride anywhere everywhere unlimited for a month.
You just need to carry the card and "tap it" on the NFC reader, and have an ID
in case of inspection. Or you can use a phone to buy a "temp" card, except it
causes so much trouble nobody uses it, including for reasons of bad chips in
the readers that refuse to work with some phones, bad app, bad infrastructure
(i.e. no 3G signal and the reader in the bus can't validate your ticket so it
refuses it, but the phone app already took your money)...

Technology is great when it's thought out. If not... may the deity of choice
be on your side in the bureaucratic maze of modern society intertwined with
digital/electronic and paper/human-based data carriers.

------
ryanlol
The original FT story
[https://www.ft.com/content/e8a177d4-dfae-11e9-9743-db5a37048...](https://www.ft.com/content/e8a177d4-dfae-11e9-9743-db5a370481bc)

Frankly, this remark by a _zdnet_ journo was rather bizarre:

>She's a writer for The Financial Times. Please don't let any personal
thoughts about that get in the way of her story.

~~~
pjlegato
Many people with leftist and anti-capitalist political views attach a strong
negative bias to anyone who works for an entity they deem supportive of the
capitalist economic system, such as major financial media.

~~~
ryanlol
Well, sure. But that still looks just as out of place as it would in the Daily
Mail.

FT is known for excellent journalism, zdnet is known for nonsense stories like
[https://www.zdnet.com/article/unsecured-mongodb-databases-
ex...](https://www.zdnet.com/article/unsecured-mongodb-databases-expose-
kremlins-backdoor-into-russian-businesses/)

------
slededit
> Next, she heard that her court case had happened and she'd been found
> guilty.

If she missed her court date then I don't know what she expected... You will
lose by default if you don't go.

~~~
rasz
In Poland people have learned about lost court cases from Court debt collector
in the middle of freezing their assets. All because there is no Service of
process procedure, courts just send ordinary letter to the registered legal
residency address.

~~~
Scoundreller
Heh, I had an account with HSBC for monthly AdSense payments.

When I moved, I guess only the mailing address got changed, not the «
registered » address.

So I continued getting monthly statements and all was well.

Tax time comes and I realize I hadn’t gotten statements in some months.

I go to the branch and they said the accounts been closed. Uh oh.

Turns out they sent all those communications and a draft for 5 figures to the
registered address I didn’t live at anymore.

Ugh.

------
NotSammyHagar
This scenario is like the early days of a dystopian future of course. But I am
constantly irritated by people who carry only their cell phone and use it for
everything, and if it goes out (runs out of power or dies) they are helpless.
Geeze

------
JohnFen
Ignoring the whole court case thing (it's ridiculous, but not really relevant
to the tech itself), this story includes a most of the issues with using a
smartphone for payments that are why I don't consider doing that to be a wise
thing.

------
deogeo
> she was charged with, well, not providing proof of payment.

How is this not guilty until proven innocent? You have to prove you paid,
otherwise you're assumed guilty.

~~~
londons_explore
There is a specific law in the UK requiring production of a ticket to a
railway inspector. Doesn't matter if you paid - you are convicted if you are
unable to produce a ticket when asked.

Considering that, I'm very surprised this reporter had her conviction quashed
- it looks like she broke the law, even if she didn't intend to. (Intent is
not required for a conviction for this law).

------
neuralRiot
I’ts not tech to blame but lack of care/ planning. If she’d had paid cash and
get a paper ticket and lost such ticket the same thing would happened.

------
o_nate
I guess the moral of this story is, if you're about to get on the bus, make
sure you have enough battery left on your phone to last until you reach your
destination. I use my phone to pay for a bus ticket every day, but I only have
to show it when I get on. If I only had 1% left on the battery, I'd probably
buy a paper ticket before heading to the gate though, just to be safe.

~~~
Tsiklon
In London the buses are entirely cashless, Contactless (Card or Apple Pay) or
Oyster (Transport for London operated cashless ticketing system) only, no
paper tickets are accepted.

On the tube one can purchase paper tickets, though these are somewhat rare now
and cannot be purchased at all stations.

