Companies At Risk For Using SMS As Billing

Oops. It looks like the big rush by various big name brands such as Virgin, MSN and Sony to use SMS as a billing mechanism for content may run into some problems. It turns out that carriers have set up guidelines that forbid using premium SMS systems for content that is not delivered and paid for over the phone - because it risks running on the wrong side of the EU's e-money laws. Since the carriers don't have "e-money licenses" they shouldn't be offering any kind of e-money. So far, they're sort of ignoring this, but as the article points out, they may run into problems as these services get more popular.
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