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Hong Kong's Octopus 271

Posted by michael from the not-talking-about-sushi dept.
Reuters is carrying an interesting story about Hong Kong's Octopus smart card system, which serves as a mass-transit fare card and is now being accepted by merchants for small purchases. A magazine cover story from last year goes more into depth. Interesting to note that the system started off anonymous, and is now being converted into a personally-trackable system.
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Hong Kong's Octopus More

Hong Kong's Octopus

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  • Don't overreact (Score:5, Interesting)

    by code65536 ( 302481 ) on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:02PM (#3670788) Homepage Journal
    Just because it has personally-trackable info doesn't mean that it's dangerous. Credit cards, for example, have your info attached through the credit card company. Has the world gone haywire yet?
    • You are just covering for Tha Man, trying to keep us all docile. You can't fool me.

      First the profile our transit usage, next it's going to be cards that read our minds and transmit our thoughts to the Illuminati! MARK MY WORDS!

    • Excellent comrade! You understand that there is nothing to fear from the Chinese government tracking which train you and your accomplices board, who you have coffee with, and where you go!

    • Re:Don't overreact (Score:3, Informative)

      by ranulf ( 182665 )
      Just because it has personally-trackable info doesn't mean that it's dangerous.

      Erm, it doesn't have personally-trackable info. I certainly didn't provide any when I had an octopus card a couple of years back, you just pay a one-time deposit when buying the card, simply to ensure you have an incentive not to loose it. If you return the card, you get your deposit back. IIRC, it's about HK$250 (£25 or US$35). Just to make sure my memory wasn't going completely crazy, I checked the article: Unless a holder chooses a personalized card, his or her identity is unknown.

      And it truly is a fantastic system. You simply wave your wallet over the reader as you walk through the turnstile and it just deducts the money. Every time you go through, it tells you how much is remaining on the card, and they even have a grace system whereby as long as the card is in credit, it will always let you through the turnstile, even if the credit isn't sufficient for the journey (which works as the card has value to you, so it's in your interests to top it up).

      With fares on the MTR really cheap, you don't need to recharge it all that often, and when you do, the recharge process takes about 30 seconds, which is less than it takes me to buy a single ticket on the London Underground.

    • Re:Don't overreact (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Rogerborg ( 306625 ) on Monday June 10, 2002 @06:39AM (#3672005) Homepage
      • Credit cards, for example, have your info attached through the credit card company. Has the world gone haywire yet?

      And a gun pointed at your head is perfectly safe and no cause for alarm, as long as it's wielded by a sane, trustyworthy individual with your best interests at heart.

      Unfortunately, once you get used to that situation, you're in deep shit when that individual is replaced by someone who doesn't fulfill those criteria.

      In other words: don't give power or authority to good men that you wouldn't want to see wielded by the bad men that might replace them. Because when the bad men take over (which history teaches us that they do with alarming regularity) it's a little too late to start clamouring for an increase in your liberties.

      Incidentally, one warning sign that you might have Bad Men in charge is that they start gifting themselves powers or information that have no readily apparent uses for good purposes.

    • That is true, but at least at the moment you have a choice - anonymous cash or trackable credit card. And credit cards are a lot more private in Europe than they are in the US. Europe has a lot of laws to limit how personal information may be bought and sold by companies (a good thing).


      Once pay cards get a foothold, paper money is going to go the way of the dodo. The advantages of a card are undeniable - no more fiddly change - but it must be anonymous, or at least very, very, very hard to track purchases back to a card. This isn't just for privacy reasons, but also for marketing reasons. Who's going to use a paycard if it's possible for the bank, private investigators or whoever to able see you bought haemmoroid cream with it - or bought a porn mag - or a girdle - or donated 50 euros to Greenpeace - or bought a right wing newspaper - or a double latte. People have to right to privacy no matter what governments or companies might think.

  • New York's metrocard (Score:5, Interesting)

    by halfpastgone ( 561230 ) on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:03PM (#3670789)
    I'd love to even see all of New York's transit integrated. Example: Last night a friend had to get a bus (which accepts the MTA metrocard) to a train (Long Island Rail Road, part of MTA but no metrocard) to a subway (6 line, definitely takes MTA Metrocard) to another train (Metro North, have to buy a ticket). I think we need to get all of our transit taken care of before branching out into other fields.

    • Re:New York's metrocard (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Well, the Metro North monthly passes double as Metrocards, and when you buy one from a machine it asks if you want to put metrocard credit on it.

    • Well, what you're talking about is pretty much how it is done in many German cities. I live in Hannover, where the system is very straightforward. You buy a ticket which covers all transit types (street tram, subway, bus, regional train) and it simply has a time limit -- usually 90 minutes, but you can also get day passes, monthly passes and so on. The price is then based on the number of zones, but the "zones" are so huge that you can almost always get away with buying a simple one-zone ticket (the "zones" are concentric rings around downtown Hannover, and the central zone covers basically the entire city and inner suburbs). For one zone, you pay €1.70 (about US$1.60) and you can travel all you want for 90 minutes in the central zone -- no transfers needed.

      (Hannover is of course the home of the CeBIT computer fair, if you're wondering. For CeBIT visitors it's even easier -- the fare is included in the price of the CeBIT ticket.)

      The way the ticket itself works is simple, too. It just shows where you bought the ticket, in what zone, and when. When the ÜSTRA employees check your ticket, all they have to do is look at the zone and time, and they know if you've paid correctly.

      You can also pay for your tickets with your GeldKarte (cashcard), which is a smart card used for paying small amounts -- you book money onto it at any cash machine, and it literally carries your money (up to €100, if I remember right) without having your bank account info stored on it. (The "cash" has a unique digital watermark with the data used to verify if the cash is real -- which of course opens up all kinds of possibilities for tracking its use...)

      Not all German cities have this worked out, though. Hamburg, for example, also has a centralized system, but the "system" is total chaos because of their rather bizarre zones. Like in Hannover, you pay for a set amount of time and number of zones, but in Hamburg the zones are miniscule. When I lived there, if I took the public transport from my flat to work, there were three different ways of getting there, all involving one transfer and all travelling the same distance and taking about the same amount of time -- yet each cost a wildly different amount. Of course, once I got a monthly pass it wasn't so bad, but I was still restricted to one part of the city with that passcard.

      One thing about Hamburg's system that is relevant to what you said is that Hamburg also has a number of private companies running its transit system (Deutsche Bahn runs the S-Bahn, Hamburger Hochbahn and several others do the U-Bahn and several companies run the bus system), but you still have one fare system and one ticketing system. Same goes for Berlin. (Hannover just has one state-sponsored company, the ÜSTRA, that does everything.)

      Berlin's system is similar to Hamburg's as well. Again you pay for one ticket regardless of what transit type you use (and no trasnfers needed), but at the departure stop, you have to look at a *huge* table of destinations to find the fare you need to pay (if you're leaving from Kurfürstendamm and travelling to Alexanderplatz, it costs so-and-so much). But the system works and doesn't need any high-tech at all, which has its advantages as well.

      Anyway, I'll stop rambling for now...

      Cheers,

      Ethelred [grantham.de]

    • (from London Transport's point of view) is that they are generally anonymous. So illegal immigrants/junkies hang around outside stations asking for your travelcard for free (once you have finished using it) to sell on (at a cheap rate) to a subsequent passenger.

      Capitalism in action (a secondary market) :-). However the train companies obviously don't like this.

      The cards themselves are machine (magnetic strip) and human readable and work seamlessly on trains, underground, trams, busses and apparently some boats (river busses).

      Obviously the authorities in HK want to use a technological means to solve a social problem (dishonesty) (which is what all tickets are in the first place).

  • No retailer signed on because they liked the cash (there's more to it than that, of course, but the value of the system didn't outweigh the cost, in short).

    Is such a system really necessary, though? And of all the things to link cash to, does mass transit fares make the most sense?

    Certainly cash is overrated (unless you're a privacy nut and have nightmares about the serial numbers on your bills), but it doesn't seem like bringing everything down into one card that can be easily lost makes much sense.

    • Re:DC Metro system had this (Score:4, Interesting)

      by earthdark ( 582375 ) on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:19PM (#3670842)
      I go back to HK every once in awhile, so I've actually *used* the system. In short, I think it's actually a worthwhile implementation cause it's a very convienent and fast system.

      I mean, absolutely no hassle, just walk up to a scanner, brush your wallet across, hear the confirmation beep and off you go. (The scanner will also display how much money you have left if you care to look)

      Works the same way on the bus too so there's no embarassment of looking for your ticket/correct change, making everyone behind you wait impatiently. Adding more money is easy too, just walk up to a special machine, insert your coin, choose amount to add, and then insert money.

      The only down side is that, cause it works so well and is so transparent, you don't really keep track of how much money is left on the card and you find yourself adding more money to the card too frequently.
      • The only down side is that, cause it works so well and is so transparent, you don't really keep track of how much money is left on the card and you find yourself adding more money to the card too frequently.

        Downside? That's the main purpose of these things.
      • The only down side is that, cause it works so well and is so transparent, you don't really keep track of how much money is left on the card and you find yourself adding more money to the card too frequently.

        Casinos require their patrons to change cash into chips for much the same reason. Four green chips on the table just don't make the same impression that a $100 bill does. It's easier to play with the colorful markers and not realize you're losing real money. The line at the cashier to change chips back into cash is also another way to part you and your money.

        Slot clubs work much the same way. Anyone who plays a lot of slots hates dealing with the mass of coins that a big win produces. Only amateurs are impressed with the shower of coins like that produced by machines in the movies. "Real" casinos (read: casinos for people who live close by and play a LOT) don't use cash at all, just a "Dave & Buster's" type card that inserts to the machine and the central computer notes your ID and keeps track of your wins (ha!) and losses.

  • tell me about it... (Score:3, Informative)

    by buzban ( 227721 ) <buz@buzbBOYSENan.net minus berry> on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:04PM (#3670796) Homepage
    i work in transit consulting, and would be tickled to see even regional cooperation in fare collection. Of course, one of the big hurdles is that transit in the U.S. is generally all sorts of little authorities, transit districts, and other independent government instruments.
    one solution? EZPass [expass.com]-style collection, where the agencies divide up the dough after charges are incurred, according to whose facility (bridge, road, whatever) was used...
    of course, for that to work, you have to tell them who you are and where you've been... ;)
    • I've always wanted to see the EZPass data...you know if you pass through one toll booth, and another one down the road a few minutes later, and the distance between the two points is known, your exact speed can be calculated. =)

      I've always wondered what the speed record was for going from I-10 to I-45 on the Hardy Toll Road =)

      • Last year, there were reports that the EZ Pass consortium was doing just that -- and that tickets were being handed out in Pennsylvania.

        I -thought- that the tickets were only being handed out if a passenger rushes through a checkpoint at a higher speed limit than what's posted (5 MPH in PA? At least Jersey has it right with 15MPH), but a former coworker insisted that they were now checking average driving speed based upon times between two gates.

        Of course, I've yet to receieve a ticket myself, either from speeding through a gate (5mph is ridiculously slow -- other cars grab tickets at a faster speed), or from speeding between two gates. Of course, it usually helps that I stop to refill gas & grab dinner at a rest stop :)
      • I've met a guy who was ticketed in a state that had extensive toll roads in this very fashion. He paid the toll at gate X and again at gate Y. For some reason they kept track of the license plates and he got fined for speeding due to the difference in time between the two gates.

        I've never driven a toll booth that logged anything about me, it's usually just chuck the change and go.

        This same guy though also claimed to have been pulled over for speeding @ 2:30 AM in WI. The fine was $105 and had to paid on the spot in cash. He handed the cop two $100s and the cop claimed he had no change. The guy said fine, let's go to the station and get some. The cop said it was 75 miles in the wrong direction, the guy said well, what about my change? The cop scrapped the ticket and told the guy to quit driving so fast.

  • It's not as bad as the post says. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Cutriss ( 262920 ) on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:04PM (#3670797) Homepage
    Anonymity is still an opt-out here. You can get a personalized card if you wish, but many users still use the plain-Jane Octopus card.

    I really wish we had something like this here in the US. Say goodbye to pocket change...Businesses and the government don't realize how much long-term savings they could have if they abolished coin currency altogether, and yet our government rushes to put forth *new* coinage, on the thin hopes that they might get enough interest from collectors and whatnot.

    Susan B. Anthony coins didn't work...you very rarely see half-dollars...and how many of you have seen Sacagawea dollars? I used a $25 roll I had a few months ago paying for a pizza delivery. Otherwise, they're useless.
    • When's the last time you dropped a penny and even gave two flying fucks about picking it up? Hell, I don't even bother to look where it rolls. The damn thing could land on my shoe, and I'd just kick it off. The fact that we still have the penny is a testament to how fucked up our government is. I expect to have the penny for many years to come ;)
      • I'll gladly take any money you wish to drop, but until I'm well enough off that my time isn't worth picking money up, you won't see me wasting money!
      • The good senators from Illinois are the ones keeping the penny alive. They have some sentimental thing going on with Lincoln and they step in everytime anyone gets serious about killing the penny. The only way the mint will get around this problem is to make a $2 coin with Lincoln on it. They have to reserve the $1 for Washinton when they drop the paper dollar except for some limited edition ones but that will cause even more of a political problem.
      • Here in Oz we did away with 1 and 2 cent pieces years ago. (Can't say that I miss them though I do have about 1 kg collection). But we still have prices set to the nearest cent (ie $9.99). What we do is add all the amounts up and then round to the nearest 5 cents (of which we still have a coin) Sometimes you win, sometimes store wins .. big deal . I think it all evens out in the end.

        A few years ago I was visiting the Denver mint, where I think the majority of US coins are made. I suggested to the tour guide that the US pennies are pretty lame and how we got rid of the equivelant. He then went into this big litany of how what we do must be cheating the people out of all that money, especially when it came to paying your taxes, and how you need the pennies to ensure that teh government was honest. Personally I think he was a nutter.

        Anyway .. it is something for you guys to consider .. how do you want prices to be set when you can't pay pennies as cash ???

      • I mean, why bother? You might strain your back and be out $50 a co-pay visit to the chiropractor.
    • Businesses and the government don't realize how much long-term savings they could have if they abolished coin currency altogether, and yet our government rushes to put forth *new* coinage, on the thin hopes that they might get enough interest from collectors and whatnot.
      The govt is not just introducing new coinage; it is attempting to phase out the printed one dollar bill. Coins last many times longer than printed bills (with somewhat similar production cost), and are thus cheaper to maintain. So in fact, the government is saving money by introducing new coinage.
      • Anonymity is still an opt-out here. You can get a personalized card if you wish

      Get back to us in a couple of years, and let us know if everything is still rosy, or whether they've gone down this route:

      1. All the cards are anonymous. Why would anyone want a personalised one?
      2. Hey, personalised cards are available. Try one. It's for your benefit, because of mumble mumble mumble.
      3. Why would anyone want an anonymous card now that personalised ones are available? What have you got to hide?
      4. Personalise your card. Now. But you can still use cash, if you want to be a burden on the economy, and you've got something to hide.
      5. Only criminals use cash. Get a card. Now

      Incidentally, I do agree with you about the utility of these things, I'm just not clear about the benefit of making them identifiable, nor why any well intentioned authority would want to do so.

  • The "uniqueness" of HK (Score:3, Insightful)

    by batkid ( 448363 ) on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:20PM (#3670848)
    How appropriate, I am now in HK and I have an octopus card in my wallet!

    It is a very well received device from what I experienced. It works really well in HK but I doubt that it will work as well in other countries/cities.

    What makes HK unique is the high concentration of people in a "homogenous" society. Being a "special administration region" under China, efficency has a higher priority over privacy. I personally think that it is a wonderful system for HK, but not very well suited for North America.
    • What does this have to do with privacy? I live in HK and have used this Octopus thing for years, and have never even imagined it can be linked with "privacy" (The personal octopus card aside). I don't mind if they extract the information like "Anonymous has taken A train from X to Y".

      And "efficiency has higher priority over privacy"? Does it mean we're sacrificing privacy over efficiency? Unless somebody actually robs my wallet and gets the octopus ID from it, nobody knows i'm that "ID123456" person which returns home at 4:00am every night..
      • The biggest key to success of this mechanism in Hong Kong is the culture. Hong Kong people, specifically consumers, do not like to put up with troublesome schemes such as using different cards or tickets for different public transportation systems. Offer them a card that does everything, and it will surely be instantly popular. Hong Kong people hate "faan" (trouble)

      • The plain-Jane Octopus is pretty much anonymous, but I have opted for one of those linked with my credit card, so when credit of my Octopus goes to zero it is automatically topped up. Very convenient, and no big loss if I ever lose my Octopus.

        In theory, the system could be abused and the government could find out what bus I took which fastfood chain I went to how much I spent at the 7-11, etc. I just make sure that when I am up to no good, I use cash instead.

    • I am an expat working in HK for the summer, and much like Batkid, have an Octopus in my wallet as well.

      Question though: in what way is HK society more homogeneous than that of any one in North America? If you mean socially and financially, im afraid that we are observing two extremely different cities. Granted, the people in the higher socio-economic tier seem to be very similar in many of their buying/transportation/etc. habits, but the other half of the people in HK are moving to the beat of a different drummer.

      As far as the implementation of such a system in North America, I don't know if dismissing the possibility right away is very founded. Besides the possiblity of hacking into the system and giving yourself a few hundred bucks(anyone know if Octopus is set with a limit?), the only obvious security problem with an anonymous system is pickpocketing.

      I would love to have someting like an octopus card in Philadelphia when I go back to school in the fall. The possiblity of hopping on the subway and buying cigarettes and snapple (Octopus can be used at 7-11 in HK) on a card I have to wave in front of a sensor is way too conveninet for me to want to pass up. Please note that I realize my dream of a cigarette-el-philly-snap' chip is a bit idealistic...im guessing that the logistics involved in such and undertaking (not to mention the cash) would prevent such a thing from getting off the ground for a while.

      • I don't think pick-pocketting is such a big concern. I'm not sure what the limits are for an Octopus card but it's not uncommon for HKers to carry thousands $HK in their pocket.

        I don't usual have more than CDN$50 in my pocket at any one time so I find the prospect of carrying thousands freightening. But in HK, it seems very normal. Somebody will pull out a $1000 bill to buy a stick of gum at 7-11 and expect to get change for it.

        In Canada, I have problems using any bill larger than a $20 at most places. Luckily for us, we have a standardize debit card system (Interac) that is acceptable almost everywhere. It's just a cultural difference.

  • what to buy? (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by twitter ( 104583 )
    an increasing number of retail merchants, from Starbucks to fast-food chains and 7-Eleven, accept the Sony-made card. Still, getting around on the city's sprawling public transportation network accounts for over 90 percent of Octopus transactions.

    Ha, ha, ha. How many five buck coffees do you think people are really going to buy?

    If Sony makes the card, and the card is cash, is Sony a mint? Is anyone with a clever piece of plastic a mint? Banking Segfault, ahh! Can no longer distinguish between legal tender that are nothing more than tokens and prommisory notes, tokens for tokens, and digital promisory notes, tokens of tokens that simply change state instead of hands.

    Now for something that has nothing to do with the price of tea in China or Octopussy, the famous Hong Kong Spy.

    Condoms? Only sailors wear condoms, baby!

    Not in the 90s, Austin.

    Well, they ought to, the filthy beggers go from port to port.

    • Re: Sony as Mint (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Abreu ( 173023 )
      In Hong Kong, there is no central bank that issues coins and bills, but 4 (at least I think its four, havent been in HKG since last year) different banks issue the same bills, each with a different building (the bank building, of course) in the back.

      Its a hoot! It Corporate Money, like in cyberpunk novels!
  • I was just in HK last week -- it was really cool to see this thing in action. Since it's relatively contactless, you can just place your entire wallet on the censor and walk through.

  • Heard a dude talk about it... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by rweir ( 96112 ) on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:31PM (#3670891) Homepage Journal
    I can't remember his name, but we had a sort-of computer ethicist come and talk to my software engineering class, and one of the examples he used was the Octopus. I guess his involvement with the project ended before this whole anonymity thing came up, but he was quite disturbed about the actual mecahnics of paying.
    You walk up to the metal plate and wave your card in front of it. If it goes withon about a cm of the plate, it is automatically debited some set amount. The disturbing thing is that, unlike nearly every other transaction in the history of trade and commerce, you do not have an option to back out when you see how much it costs, nor do you get any permanent record of the transaction. You could walk past the scanner and have your card debited a few times while it's in your pocket, and you'd never know.
    It was a very interesting talk, raising issues that I'd never thought about before, but I think are extremely important to consider.
    • I'm in Hong Kong and have been designing train stations for 10 years. Your Dude is so wrong.

      It's great that it senses within 1cm of the plate - but you have to pause slightly for it to confirm the transaction. Also even if you want to you can't use the same card for multiple payments - say paying for your girl friend's ride on your card after paying for your own.

      It is not disturbing that you don't know the price. It's like a toll road - you travel a certain distance and pay the amount. Once you get to the toll gate you can't go "Uh that's too much - I'm gonna go back now".

      Octopus in HK is so important for transit - the flowrates through the gates had to be increased along with all the calculations for the number of people on the platforms. The extra second it saves changes the way people use the system. With the density of movement the speed of passengers going through the Octopus gates affects the train frequency.

      Without Octopus the system would not run as well for passengers or operators.

      The funny thing is that you all think of it as Science Fiction, to us it is normal.... just wait 'til you see the mile long escalator that climbs from Central to Mid-Levels.....
    • The average cost of a one-way subway journey in HK is somewhere around $.75.

      You have to pass the card somewhere near the scanner. Your pocket is not close enough.

      The amount of money we're talking about is chump change. Even for the poor. Not only that, but it tells you how much is left on your card every time you exit one of the stations. It's all relatively transparent. No, you can't rescind the transaction easily, but it's possible. You just have to see an attendant.

  • I don't know what to think about those kinds of cards. In the Netherlands we have ATM cards that have little chips on them that you can charge and then use to make small payments. We have paper tickets called ``strippenkaarten'' that have a number of units on them. These can be used for most kinds of public transportation, the notable exception being long-distance trains. Supposedly, these paper cards could be replaced entirely by the electronic ones, which are already used to pay at vending machines, phone booths, and various shops. Somehow, though, it seems that people want to hold some hard money in their hands, either in the form of cash or in the form of tickets. Perhaps eventually the chip cards will take over, but I don't see it happen in the near future.

  • Octopus -- IS OPTiONAL! (Score:5, Informative)

    by BWS ( 104239 ) <swang@cs.dal.ca> on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:32PM (#3670898)
    Lemme say this again.... The Octopus card is optional.... you can ride the Bus, Subway, Star ferry, subway to the customs for China by paying cash. No one forces you to get a Octopus card.

    However saying that, I have one myself and would remark at its conviecne. When I went on vacation to HK and China a while ago, I stayed in H.K. for ~10 days and I even got one myself. No more
    looking for correct change at bus stations or
    subway depots. It is really convenient. And yes, you can buy one anonymously. When you go pick them up (pay HKD50 for deposit) you are given
    the OPTION to personalize, but you don't have it.

    For those in Canada/USA the buses operate somewhat differently, there is no 'transfers' or whatever they're called in H.K. For example in Toronto you only pay one fair for each one way trip and you get a transfer for when you change bus or subways. In Hong Kong you pay each time you get on a bus, train, subway ... if you change bus you pay again.

    Whereas in most places the ticket prices for bus or subway is fixed (I know its like $2 in Toronto, Canada) its different in Hong Kong. The price for subways and buses depends on approximately how far you travel (by approximately I mean say they divide one bus route into 5 zones and set a certain price if you travel within one zone and different if you travel though one zone, two zone,etc)

    The combination of the above two factors is probably why the Octopus system became popular. People got really annoyed carrying large amounts of change at all times (remember, buses don't give change). This is very different from the way most public transit (bus/subway) work in North American cities.

    • The combination of the above two factors is probably why the Octopus system became popular. People got really annoyed carrying large amounts of change at all times (remember, buses don't give change). This is very different from the way most public transit (bus/subway) work in North American cities.


      Another important advantage of the Octopus card is the speed in which the entry and exit checkpoints can read the cards. Before the Octopus, Hong Kong's Mass Transit Railway [mtr.com.hk] used magnetic cards similar to Washington D.C.'s metro. After inserting the magnetic card into the turnstile checkpoint, it takes less than a second for the computer to process and return the card and unlock the turnstile.

      With the Octopus card, you don't even need to take your card from your wallet or purse, you simply swipe your wallet/purse over a square area at the checkpoint, and it actually saves time!

      While it may seem like a small savings of time, the MTR carries on average of 2.3 million passengers per day, which is remarkable since (a) it is a highly congested system, and (b) the population of Hong Kong is a little over 7 million.

      It should be noted that the MTR still uses magnetic cards for single-trip fares; assuming you've paid the correct fare the exit checkpoint will keep the card and let you out -- very environmentally friendly indeed.
    • Whereas in most places the ticket prices for bus or subway is fixed (I know its like $2 in Toronto, Canada) its different in Hong Kong. The price for subways and buses depends on approximately how far you travel (by approximately I mean say they divide one bus route into 5 zones and set a certain price if you travel within one zone and different if you travel though one zone, two zone,etc)

      I can't speak for all cities, but Vancouver and Montreal both divide into zones. The difference is that the zones are absurdly large (it's a three zone fare from Surrey Central to Waterfront, and a two-zone fare from Waterfront to Lonsdale Quay in North Van, which is a half hour by car (more incl. traffic) and, depending on traffic, between a half hour and four hours, respectively).

      However, that doesn't change much. At Surrey Central, you can buy a three-zone fare for about $4 (I think), or you can get a Daypass for $5. The three zone fare is one way, one use. The daypass is unlimited travel in all zones on all transports until midnight or so. Easy choice.

      In Montreal, it's even more fun. A one week pass is $13, and a monthly pass is $54. These give you unlimited travel in all zones (there are three on the island). Other passes and fares and so on that you can get allow transit within the first zone only (which is damned big anyway), but those two let you use the metro, the busses, and even the Via commuter rail.

      Israel, by contrast, has a train system that does not work anymore, and busses that, while they charge you for every trip (two people going halfway across Jerusalem, it was cheaper to get a taxi), DO give change (surprised the hell out of me, I thought you just pay and you're done; nope, they give change and a reciept. oops). I imagine this would go over very well there, but the competing transit companies probably wouldn't want to go into something unless the other person was as well. Who knows though.

      --Dan
      • A one week pass is $13, and a monthly pass is $54

        I'd love to see the weekly vs monthly pass sales broken down by month.
        How many monthly ticket buyers notice they should buy 4 weekly passes in FEBURARY! LOL

        P.S.
        For those who don't want to do the math: Feburary = 28 days. 4 weekly passes at $13 each is $52, cheaper than the $54 monthly pass.

        -
      • hehe... but its crazier then that...

        The zoning is dependent on the bus. Lets say you get on the #5 bus and takes it for a few stops... you fare is dependent on the distance the bus takes you (# of stops and such)..

        however, if you switch to another bus the zones are calculated different because the bus travels different route
    • Actually, the thing that makes it possible is that in HK, you pay depending on where you get ON a bus. Doesn't matter if you get off at the terminal or the next stop.

      Compare with Australia: you tell them where you want to get off and they calc the distance, and have bus nazis come on the busses checking if anyone stayed further than they paid for

      Or in Japan: Get a mag tix when you get on, when you get off, dump the tix in the machine and it tells you how much to pay.

      In HK it's swipe and go. In AU it would be choose a dest, then swipe. In JP, well the current card system seems OK as it is, can't save much time.

      Another problem is, in AU they don't even have turnstiles in every train station, fat chance getting everyone to install a new system. Hey, we also have no less than 3 systems for electronic highway tolls in Sydney alone.
  • In Hong Kong, you need an Octopus card! You get off the airport, the first thing you need is your card (in order to take bus or train away from the airport) Unless you take taxi that it.

    The major advantage for the public is the easiness of use. Instead of picking nickles and dimes, you use this card. Waiting for people to pick the exact change takes a long time, just because of the number of people there. For you normal North American, imagine every where in HK is like downtown NY or LA, every where is crowded. And most people take public transport, any sort of slow down can make a congestion (sort of like traffic jam but with human).

    • In Hong Kong, you need an Octopus card! You get off the airport, the first thing you need is your card (in order to take bus or train away from the airport) Unless you take taxi that it.

      I'm not sure about the Airport Express line, but for other railway routes, you can get a temporary ticket by paying cash. No need for the Octopus card if you really don't want it. (Not that there is a reason not to want it though)

      And for buses, you can still pay with cash.
  • I am amused by many posts concerning privacy. If you read the article carefully, Most of the card used are just as anonymous as cash, they don't have identity on the card, unless you choose. It's electronically stored cash.
    The article is not very clear how the operator insure the security of the system. With cash, pocket picker has to get close to me to get the money, but for the contactless card, what will happen a hacker set up a money collecting device at downtown charging each person 5c for using zebra lines? Even worse, the cracker can erase all the cash on the card, without actually steal it. Do you still call it theft?
    Just wondering.
    • The article is not very clear how the operator insure the security of the system. With cash, pocket picker has to get close to me to get the money, but for the contactless card, what will happen a hacker set up a money collecting device at downtown charging each person 5c for using zebra lines?
      The system does use strong encryption for every transaction - so while it's pretty easy to make your own portable reader, it isn't as easy to get money off someone elses card. Given that the system has been running for 5 years, the technology has proved itself. (Of course, as with any electronic system, there's no guarantee that it won't be cracked tomorrow ...).

      Incidentally, each card does have a unique ID built in (which isn't linked to your own identity unless you want it), so they could in principal store in a central DB all the transactions of a particular card, and so validate what it's total credit should be - I assume they already do this to make fraud harder.
  • An Octopus card? Which means a card with 8 testicles or what?

    Weird guys, those Hong Kong guys... :S

  • So is this like the system in Singapore? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by thogard ( 43403 ) on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:43PM (#3670933) Homepage
    The Signapore goverment has a system that has been cracked wide open. Its not a major problem because if you get caught, your in jail for decades and can never get a job. The result is most of the people who have the ability to casually hack the system aren't about to even try.

    Once cool thing with these (and Mondex) is that if you lose the card, someone else keeps the cash. Anyone who has ever worked in a student ID office or drivers license department can tell you how offten people lose these things.

    So far no one has built a smart card that has enough grunt to do real hard crypto in a reasonable about of time while making the chip so it can't be inspected in a way to find out its secrets. We have a long way to go before someone comes up with a contactless card that can do a transaction faster than two people who are good at handling cash.
  • The government can track our spending habits through credit card purchases, our interests through our web-site trails, and our movements with this new card. They spy on our houses with their spy satelites, bug our phones in the name of National Security. However, even worse, salesmen can use this information to bring us the latest in crap we don't need but might buy anyway. It's time every car in it had an 'electronic leash', or a chip so we can never get lost...or so they can never lose us.
  • The recent article is basically a summary of the first. They both say that the smart cards are used for micropayments and that some people choose to have their identification information stored.

    What is interesting is that it is so wide spread throughout Hong Kong and rapidly growing in Asia. Areas where mass transportation due to overcrowding provide the perfect opportunity. Keep in mind, however, that while your money is sitting on that pre-paid card, its not accruing interest in your bank account.

    • >>
      Keep in mind, however, that while your money is sitting on that pre-paid card, its not accruing interest in your bank account.
      >>

      Considering that you probably wouldn't have more than about US$30 on your card at any time, is it even worth caring about?

  • There are no privacy issues whatsoever. (Score:3, Informative)

    by Howzer ( 580315 ) <grabshot&hotmail,com> on Sunday June 09, 2002 @09:51PM (#3670953) Homepage Journal
    Octopus as it currently works is completely anonymous.

    I have one in my wallet at the moment. One of the best things about it, is that I can charge it up with HKD1000 or so, and then just leave it in my wallet. Then, whenever I am in HK (once a month or more) I can just get on and off the subway, buy lunches and newspapers and more, without the hassle of carrying currency every single trip, no making change, no collecting coins, etc. It's wonderful.

    And let me stress again, it's completely anonymous. You buy the cards with cash; you refill them with cash.

    That's not to say that some future system will have "opt in for a special deal" features, which you can accept/reject just like you accept/reject loyalty cards. In fact, having some sort of personalisation may enable you to make a phone call to cancel your card should it be stolen. And that would be a good thing.

    I can't help but think much of the knee-jerk negativity in here is simple jealousy. Octopus is a fantastically popular, totally secure, wonderfully convenient system. Perhaps some posters secretly wish that their local governments had the balls to introduce something as clever.

    Also, it's OLD NEWS. The system has been running for ages.

  • Also something similar here in Portugal (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fsmunoz ( 267297 ) <fsmunoz&member,fsf,org> on Sunday June 09, 2002 @10:00PM (#3670976) Homepage
    For years now highway fares are being paid with a smartcard that's put on the interior of the car; the subway is payed with a smartcard. The fuel can also be paid with a smartcard.

    What's interesting is that some years ago they deployed hundreds of small terminals that could read a smartcard (called in a loose translation 'electronic wallet') nation-wide anywhere where payments were to be made; transportations, stores, malls, even taxis carried the small terminal. One would transfer money from the main account to that card and that was it, the card had no apparent identification mechanism (to the point were loosing the smartcard was the same as loosing a wallet). It was pretty neat, but never really caught up. Inertia, people's confusion about the device and the fact that ppl are so used to having money or paying everything with a card...

    Which brings me to a question: just about everything is payed with a bank card (VISA Electron, put in, confirm value, insert PIN, done). Every example above can also be payed with this card (except taxis) and the terminals are prepared in many cases to be self operated e.g. gas stations, public transportations, etc). Doesn't that count as 'moneyless society

    In a way we are more and more dependent on plastic ; I suppose that the thing that's interesting about this Octopus thing is that it putis it all together, the 'scanning' capability used in highways, the portability of a 'electronic wallet' and the availabilty of VISA Electron.

    Just my 2 euro cents,

    fsmunoz
  • I'm not entirely up to date as to the security or privacy issues since I only visited recently, but here is why a lot of people choose to use it: it is fast. In fact, if you have no other cards with magnetic stripes on them, you can just stick your purse/backpack/wallet close to the reader and it will take your money. It is that fast.

    Of course, if privacy or security is a concern one can always opt for cash which works just as well.
    • My wallet has my ATM cards, Credit Cards, ID Card and my Work Electronic Access Card as well as my Octopus card. The Octopus sensor can read just the Octopus card from all of that junk.

      Also, you can get watches with the Octopus circuit now, if you're too lazy to go looking for your wallet, but the sensor is usually on the right hand side of the gate, so so watch is a little awkward. (Handier for the buses, which have the sensor on the left as you go in, however.)

      Thirdly, there is a small discount (about 5%) for using Octopus on either of the main railway systems.

      As to why HK has the best transit system in the world: Well, many parts of the city are built on thin coastal strips between the mountains and the sea. When you have a long, thin city, you can easily stick a heavy rail system down the middle of it and it'll serve almost every one. Most of the stations are less than 500m apart, and located in very densely populated areas. The train frequency is 1 train per minute in the peak times, and the trains are air-conditioned. Also, mobile phones work in the tunnels, so you can keep in touch with your wheeling and dealing (or talking about food) which suits yer average HKer down to the ground.

      In short: it's quick, cheap, clean and easy.

      dave

  • Smart Cards in Tokyo (Score:3, Insightful)

    by cjs ( 12969 ) <cjs@cynic.net> on Sunday June 09, 2002 @10:17PM (#3671028) Homepage
    Here in Tokyo, Japan Railways East introduced a contactless smart card called "Suica" last year. It's particularly convenient because one card can serve as both a stored value card and a commuter pass. When part of my trip uses the line for which I have a commuter pass, I swipe the card at the end of the journey and it deducts for only that portion of the journey that was not using my commuter line.

    Unfortunately, this card, though good on JR, can't be used on the subways or private railways. But I hear that this may be coming.

    The biggest cellphone provider here, Docomo, is set to introduce a contactless smart card chip in its new mobile phones later this year, which should be particularly interesting.

    cjs
    • why is this 3 screenswide and how do i fix it pease?
    • When you purchase a commuter pass, you have to give personal information (name, address, telephone number, place of work) to the railway company. That isn't a big problem with the previous magnetic cards, because the information isn't stored on the card in an electronically-readable format (your name is printed on the non-magnetic side). But with Suica, each card gets an ID number, which is correlated with your personal info in a database. And every time you pass through a ticket gate, that ID is transmitted to a central computer. Need I say more?

      Granted, this isn't necessarily a huge invasion of privacy, much like buying things with credit cards isn't necessarily a huge invasion of privacy. But as I live in what's commonly regarded as one of the most dangerous parts of the Tokyo metro area, I'm not at all thrilled about the possibility of thieves finding out exactly what time I get on and off the train each day.

      As a side note, Suica is anonymous (I think) when you use it as a plain charge card; but there are already magnetic charge cards which do the same thing (plus give you a printout on the card of each transaction), and I really can't convince myself that saving the extra 0.7 seconds or so I'd gain by using the IC card is worth it.

      • Actually, you don't have to give valid personal information. Just buy the pass at a machine, and type in whatever you like. The only risk is that you won't be able to get a replacement card should you lose it. And I'm not convinced that they're not doing this same ID thing with the paper passes, anyway.

        And very likely you're still being tracked even when you use the stored-charge-only Suica card (though not by name, of course). Everybody does it, it seems. New York's MTA has been for years tracking and storing every use of one of their magnetic-stripe cards. If you can get hold of someone's card (probably after it's run out of charge or expired), you can mail it in to them and they'll send you back a list of all the stations, dates and times where it was used. (One of the first things NYC cops will often do when they pick you up is grab your MTA card, so they can find out where you've been recently.)

        cjs
  • Be sure and pick up one of these. They have a great tourist deal that has a 3-day unlimited use of the subway and a return trip on the airport express. If you do this, be sure and check your bags in at the downtown station. They will be checked through all the way to the plane.

  • Cashless Society (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Repton ( 60818 )
    A cashless society could have happened here (New Zealand), I guess, if it weren't for one thing: Bank fees.

    Almost everyone these days has an EFTPOS card (Electronic Funds Transfer at Point Of Sale). I guess you might call it a debit card --- it is like a credit card, but with no credit. You can only spend money you have in your account.

    And virtually every shop can take EFTPOS, from dairies to retail to second hand bookshops to cinemas...

    The only problem is the banks. Typically, they allow a small minimum number of free transactions per month, and beyond that, you start paying fees per transaction. So unless you really want to donate money to your friendly (foreign-owned) bank, you use cash for small transactions...

    Maybe we need someone to start something like Octopus here. If everyone suddenly stopped using EFTPOS, the banks might finally get a clue...

    • Re:Cashless Society (Score:2, Interesting)

      by sn00ker ( 172521 )
      And virtually every shop can take EFTPOS, from dairies to retail to second hand bookshops to cinemas...
      NZ has embraced EFTPOS completely, to the point that merchants that don't take it are the exception. You can even buy KFC and McDonald's with EFTPOS.
      The only problem is the banks. Typically, they allow a small minimum number of free transactions per month, and beyond that, you start paying fees per transaction. So unless you really want to donate money to your friendly (foreign-owned) bank, you use cash for small transactions...
      And we're not talking a couple of cents per transaction, either. The cheapest bank charges 15c/transaction, and there are some which charge up to 60c/transaction. Which doesn't sound like much, until one uses EFTPOS for everything. I used to do this, until my bank got a clue and realised I was no longer a student - Now I draw cash from an ATM (at 40c/withdrawl, the bastards), and pay cash for everything. It's a hassle, but I don't like throwing money at greedy assholes.

      NZ is something of a rarity, with regard to our willingness to try new technology. Our uptake of Internet access was the highest in the world for a period. We still rate very highly on a per-capita connection level, but with our low population density a lot of the country doesn't have access to things as basic as dialup - Any speed dialup. Something like 15% of the population has access to nothing faster than 9.6kbs.
      A card such as Octopus could be of use here, but it would require a lot more integration within the public transport system. Nowhere more so than Auckland, our largest city, which has no unity of payment for public transport systems (buses, ferries and trains) and exorbitant charges. There's much talk of a unified payment system, and maybe Octopus will be considered, but this would require the local body polly tubbies to extract their heads from their rectums and I can't see that happening any time soon.

  • They Could've Called It Carnivore . . . (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It's true that the normal Octopus Card doesn't identify the holder as such, but the card itself has an identifying number blind-stamped on the front as well as an identifying code in the chip, which also retains the details of the last trip made. The identifying code and travel information are recorded each time the card is used; if the chip gets damaged, this information is used to reconstruct the value of the card.

    That the card doesn't identify a traveller by name doesn't mean there isn't a privacy concern; since most people use just one Octopus Card and keep adding value to it from time to time the record of that card's use is also the record of that user's travels. I haven't heard of police taking down the details of a suspect's Octopus Card for investigation, but it's certainly a possibility.

    Though Octopus has the form of a private venture, it is wholly-owned by the SAR's transport operators and indirectly controlled by the HK Government, which holds a 66 percent indirect interest in the venture. The MTR, which operates the HK subway, holds a controlling interest of 57.4 percent in Octopus and the heavy and light rail operator KRC holds 22.1 percen in it. While the bus and ferry system operators are private operations, both the MTR and the KRC are government-controlled. Government-backing and acceptance of the card by the practically all public transport operators has almost guaranteed its success. (In his interview with Reuters, Eric Tai of Octopus disingenously down-plays the HK Government's role in transport. The MTR was 100 percent government-owned at the time Octopus was established and, after a partial privatisation, remains 77 percent government-owned; the KCR is still 100 percent government-owned.) An alternative cash card for shopping alone, the Mondex Card, sponsored by HSBC, the SAR's biggest bank, failed big.

    Technical details about the Octopus Card are at these links:

    http://www.octopuscards.com/octopus_eng/e_what_o ct _2.htm

    http://www.sony.co.jp/en/Products/felica/content s0 2b.html
  • Reuters is carrying an interesting story about Hong Kong's Octopus smart card system, which serves as a mass-transit fare card and is now being accepted by merchants for small purchases. A magazine cover story from last year goes more into depth. Interesting to note that the system started off anonymous, and is now being converted into a personally-trackable system.
    *Disclaimer* I worked on the product, I have not read the article...

    When I was working on this project, three years ago, there were two types of cards available. The first was completely anonymous, the card could be tracked, but it could not be linked to anyone. It was sold over the counter, without identification, and had way of associating itself with it's user.

    The second type of card was personalised. This card could also be linked to your savings account, and when your travel card got low on funds could automatically top itself up. You had to request this specifically! Lots of people did, because it is incredibly convenient, since you never have to buy a ticket ever again. And, since the cards are contactless you never even needed to take it out of your wallet/purse.

    So, unless they have changed the system quite dramatically in the last three years, then there is no difference, and it has not been "converted", and you can still be anonymous if you wish.

  • the thing Octopus piss me off is that it charges HK$50 prepayment. There's no way we could get back that prepayment as long as you are using their service, and when you lost the card you've to pay that HK$50 again. That's why regardless of the fact that we have only 6mil-7mil residents, they've sold 8mils Octopus. Good deal(for them).

    Octopus has become a society problems here. Kids are allowed to use the Octopus to pay goods and services in many areas like department store and internet Cafe, etc. People are concerned that while the payment is untrackable, their parents cannot tell where their kids spent their money.

    Location-based tracking system is a rather profitable business here because GPS generally fails to work in a city with a lot of high-rising buildings due to blocking and reflection. People are now developing location-based tracking with GPS sims and it works great. I don't think Octopus is better than GSM sims in this case as in normal case a GSM sims is synchronized with 6 GSM location based stations(NNM system) and the result is close to 25M radius.
  • and it can be used to track you if they got your information linked to this unique ID. Just like the unique ID inside Pentium III.

    However, it's difficult to link one's personal information to this smart card because we are not required to submit our personal information when buying an Octopus card. Therefore I'll not trade my privacy to a lousy company like Cafe da Carol who sell lousy food just because I want eat some fast food real fast. :)

  • I mean, I know that (e.g.) VISA charge vendors a flat 35 cents plus ~2.5% of the transaction, which makes them all but useless for small payments. However, I was wondering how much of this actually goes to VISA and how much to the intermediate issuer.

    I'm thinking of a travel credit card issued by a consortium of bus, train, subway, even air companies, that doesn't bill participating companies the handling charge when its used to pay for fares. That gives you a card that you can use for other purchases, and which gets you on a bus with one swipe. The level of fraud would be so small as to not make it worth while sweating about validating the transactions (although you could download lists of cancelled or bad cards to the readers) and any money you do lose through fraud, you get back through not handling cash.

    Failing that, is there room for a new card on the market? Transport is a big industry with a lot of customers; they should be able to leverage that to get vendors to accept a new TravelCard.

    There's plenty of incentive for both sides. For vendors, it's no worse than standard credit cards (and it could be sweetened). For the travel businesses, it does away with a lot of cash handling, plus it gives them extra income from those fat 2.5% + 35 cents fees (or whatever they'd charge) when you use it to make purchases.

  • Where do you get the notion that "Unless a holder chooses a personalized card, his or her identity is unknown" means a previously anonymized system is being converted to a personally trackable system? You are invoking a well known logical fallacy by assuming that because an unknown representative sample has chosen to allow tracking, that somehow the system as a whole has no anonymity? I didn't see you link to anything that gave me numbers which suggest that anonymity is being lost in great amounts. Therefore, I'd have to conclude that you are spreading FUD.
  • I'm sure if the same system can work anywhere else in the world. People in Hong Kong tend to put efficiency over anything else. Even large transaction are often done with cash.

    The Octopus card is a great little tool and very convenient for tourists. Except for taxi cabs, I was able to use my card on bus, trains, MTR(subway), boats, tram (upto the Victoria peak), minibus, etc... Being able to use it at 7-11 and fast-food joints is a bonus.

    I actually thought it was pretty cool. I walked by a vending machine and did a Jedi butt wave (back pocket had my wallet where the card has contained) and got a Coke out of the machine.

    It's one of those neat memory of my trip to Hong Kong... That and all the gadgets on Apliu Street, Shum Shui Po, and Mokng Kok.

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