The SIESTA project: Near Field Communication based applications for tourism

In this paper we describe an innovative system providing services for tourism based on Near Field Communication technology. This work is part of the SIESTA project, co-funded by the Tuscany Region in Italy, to develop applications relying on mobile phones to support tourists visiting cities of art. Near Field Communication mixes the functionalities of RFID systems with the communication capabilities of common mobile phones, opening the way to new uses of the phones, in particular in the fields of Mobile Payment and Mobile Ticketing. In the SIESTA project two different kinds of applications are studied and then joined together to implement a system allowing the user to perform both M-Ticketing operations, with the mobile phone turned into a multipurpose electronic ticket, and M-Payment operations, with the phone turned into an electronic wallet for micro-payment operations. In particular the system focuses on mobile ticketing automatization for events and services, and on mobile micro-payment of services like bus tickets.