Although the opportunities to utilise mobile technologies in development work are numerous, most development organisations lack the understanding and the capacity to pilot and implement anything other than the most trivial ideas. Even for a technically minded person the number of issues to be aware of, when planning concepts and considering the best ways to implement projects, is overwhelming without previous experience. Fortunately, it is possible to build capacity via piloting smaller scale projects with relatively small investments. If results are positive, more comprehensive implementations can be done, and the most successful projects can be replicated within a specific development sector, where gained expertise should be shared.
The most notable challenges are very typical to any other technology enhanced project including how to sustain the project, how to ensure that the organisation and their beneficiaries have access to the necessary technology, how to deal with several technology issues from capacity to support, how to get buy-in from the community, how to protect the privacy of participants and information, as well as how to understand some of the potential requirements local policies or regulations have set.
Sustainability
Many great ideas will be turned down after a careful cost estimation has been prepared. Technical expertise is scarce and expensive, devices are being taxed in the luxury category, and the lack of competition keeps voice and data services high. However, projects with eventual scaling potential, or that have low technology and capacity requirements, can reduce costs substantially if they they increase efficiency or simplify processes. In these cases, the initial investment in terms of funding and human resources is worthwhile, because in the long term the costs will be recovered.
Cost estimations may be difficult to prepare for someone who hasn't been involved with similar budgeting tasks before. Set-up and running costs of an initiative may have hidden expenses or the complexity of the different pricing models might take an inordinate amount of time to understand. Also, traditional expenses such as marketing of a new service may be forgotten as a part of the total budget, which may result in project failure. Other important risks are the lack of understanding that the beneficiaries of a new service may not be able to cover any extra cost, especially if there is a lack of money for food and other necessities. On the other hand, if a new mobile service is more popular than initially estimated, this may result in a huge financial losses if an organisation is subsidising some or all of the costs of the service.
In some cases sustainability won't be a problem, particularly if mobile technologies are used to generate extra income and there is a clear business model. One should be cautious about fundraising campaigns though, if the revenue sharing models currently used by the mobile operators and technology providers don't change from the current standards. Until then, fundraising via mobile phones will only be an attractive option if the scale of the campaign is big, or if an organisation is able to negotiate a good deal with operators and service providers by using their corporate social responsibility as a justification.
Access
The term 'access' is very broad and can be understood in many levels, as an excellent real access framework concept document of Bridges.org explains. In this study report, only a few of the main points are highlighted (and some of the points are actually mentioned in other chapters of this section) to give examples of situations that organisations should be prepared for, before initiating a mobile technology project.
First of all, there is a big difference in terms of access when comparing urban areas to rural areas. Rural areas suffer from power and network failures more often, may not have any electricity or very limited mobile networks, and have a much more difficult financial situation. Also, the illiteracy levels are higher, and even though mobile phones have found their ways into very rural communities, the capacity to use them is often quite limited.
Even within urban areas, the access to mobile technologies and services often differs between the so called social classes, and poor people can rarely afford more than basic hand-sets and services and mostly use phones to make or receive phone calls and text messaging.
Social dynamics bring another access related challenge. Sharing of mobile phones may be popular and would limit the types of services that organisations can offer to their beneficiaries. Also, the younger the generation the more technology savvy people are, and in some situations the presence of children and their help is needed for elder people to use mobile devices. Gender inequality should not be forgotten, since often men are the owners of the phones, and women may only be allowed to use a phone when a husband is nearby.
Cultural and social aspects
Cultural and social aspects are very important. Even though technology providers do create new markets and needs, that were not part of people's lives earlier, the often criticised top-down approach has risks, especially in projects where communities are beneficiaries. A solution, that is supposed to address an identified problem, may not be seen as a problem on the ground, and the community may not understand the relevance of a mobile solution. Trying to help the communities by making their lives easier may even been seen an attempt to interfere with more traditional systems and processes that are socially valuable.
Even if people are interested in the initiative, lack of trust may also become a major problem. People may feel uncomfortable sharing their mobile numbers if they are not able to trust the organisation and its staff. Initiatives addressing HIV/AIDS or other highly stigmatised issue will have even more difficulties ensuring that peoples identities won't be shared and their privacy will be protected. Without gaining the trust of the community, there will be a lack of participation.
The way people use technology may also differ from the assumptions that are made. In countries where long term contracts are minority, people may purchase new pre paid SIM cards if they are given attractive deals and therefore change their phone numbers. The formality of mobile phone interaction is also different to equivalent mail or email correspondence, since phone conversations and text messages are not saved and archived. Also, in areas with a high crime rate phones might not be carried all the time to lower the risk of phone theft.
Privacy and mobile surveillance
Anonymous phone use is possible, but can be very difficult to ensure, which is an important issue for mobile activists. Mobile operators can be ordered to hand over log information that could be used against activists. The fact that mobile phones are easily traced has resulted in cases where activists have left their phones at home without switching them off, when a group of people are meeting or during large flash mobilisation campaigns. Also, photos taken with mobile phone cameras include lots of so called metadata (“Information about data” as introduced in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta-data), that should be removed to prevent the tracking of the photos - something that only a few users would know how to do.
Technology
Many development organisations without dedicated internal or contracted external technology staff often find it difficult to use new technologies. Capacity to plan how technologies influence the organisation's processes or to assess whether or not existing technology infrastructure is adequate are just a few examples. Without previous experience the variety of service providers and applications may be challenging to cope with. Also, technology solutions should support efficiency and not engage key staff in support and maintenance issues. Other typical technology challenges are the lack of policies and an efficient monitoring system to ensure that the policies are being followed, lack of documentation, non-existent security measures or back-up procedures.
Mobile technologies bring additional technology challenges to organisations. With such a fast pace of mobile technology developments, it requires a commitment to be aware of the market and understand what are the best solutions to specific needs. Currently, if mobile phones are used for projects that have several participants and beneficiaries, the applicable technologies are limited to voice and text messages. In the future, when basic handsets include more advanced functionality (and most of the phones have photo viewing capabilities, internet browsers, GPS, media players, radios, etc..), possibilities are much wider. Obviously, these devices are even more complex to learn and the ability to reach marginalised people may not become much easier than it is now.
Mobile phones have several limitations including their small display size, poor durability (for example in bad weather), the need to charge the battery continuously, and limited processing and storage capabilities. In addition, popular technologies such as text messages are only 160 characters long and some of the applications are not very intuitive (and lack good user guides). Unfortunately many current applications are very vulnerable to small user mistakes, and for example services where a simple user-typed key word needs to be sent to a given number would fail if there are any misspellings.
As mobiles add another information source, this will make the knowledge management of an organisation even more complex, where the proper integration of information is essential.
Mobile networks are not the most transparent and it may be impossible to get a full understanding of the the network logic. Therefore a typical problem with text messages is that it may not always be possible to get a confirmation that all the messages that were sent were actually delivered. For programs or services that work in more than one country, this is currently a major problem.
Policies and regulations
Policies and regulations relating to mobile technologies are an issue that most development organisations rarely consider even though they can have a major influence on local situations. In liberal regions where political will is strong to support the development of a competitive environment for network operators and services, the costs and network coverage are usually much more favourable compared to less liberal countries. In the worst cases governments or mobile operators are limiting the use of certain technologies from text messages (e.g. Ethiopia banned the use of text messages until recently) to VOIP over mobile network phone calls (e.g. in South Africa) which naturally limit the ways how organisations can utilise mobile technologies.
Governments may also have a right to limit the actions of mobile operators and there have already been examples where mobile phone use has not been possible during a political election period or in times when the government has felt that mobile phones would threaten its security.
Ethics and code of conduct
Because the use of mobiles by development organisations has not been that common yet, a clear code of conduct or commonly shared ethics for mobile initiatives have not been formed. In many countries there are laws and regulations that would set legal barriers, for example for mass marketing campaigns or how personal information should be stored and protected. However, to understand the laws and regulations, or even figuring out what policies do apply, is a demanding task. In addition to these legal limitations, there should be unwritten ethical rules that individuals and organisations are expected to follow. Examples of important issues, that development organisations may not be aware of, are given below.
Transparency when collecting mobile phone numbers or marketing the service
People have the right to understand what is required from them when they allow an organisation to use their mobile phones or are subscribing to mobile phone services. Collecting lists of mobile phone numbers by fooling or intimidating people is definitely unethical. Also, using numbers from an existing membership database may not be accepted, unless a permission was asked when the details were collected in the first place. In any situation, people should not put themselves in danger, unless potential risks have been clearly explained.
When marketing a service costs should be emphasised. This is also important for projects where an organisation is piloting a free or subsidised service, which would include a cost at a later stage.
Intelligent mass messaging
The use of email as a communication tool has showed that if not used carefully, sending out messages to people may be seen as annoying, and is often referred to as spam. Therefore it is essential to only send messages that the audience has signed up for, and allow people to unsubscribe from the service easily. Text messages (and in the future messages containing multimedia) are still much more personal approaches than many other communication forms, and should not be used too often. Also, the identity of the sender of the message should not be concealed.
Respecting and protecting privacy
Being able to respect several privacy aspects may sound easy but in reality even big companies are not succeeding in this task. A simple rule that most organisations should know is that personal information including mobile phone numbers should not be shared without permission. Also, organisations shouldn't collect more personal information than essential. Organisations should be aware that multimedia content, such as photos, should be modified in a way that vulnerable persons such as victims of torture are not identifiable.
Even though information is not being shared openly, it is very difficult to set-up technical systems that would provide an extremely safe environment and secure both personal information and the information carried by mobile technologies. Therefore it is recommended, that without properly audited systems in place, people should be warned about privacy risks.
Quality control
When conducting surveys, collecting a list of names to participate in petitions, publishing material produced via citizen journalism, or implementing similar projects, organisations should be aware of quality aspects. Information should be validated and internal checks that support the quality should be a part of the project. This is particularly important in cases where people are being compensated for producing content or helping with surveys.
Effective Electronic Communications
When communicating electronically it is important to consider the language and level of formality used because of the lack of non-verbal communication, tone and similar limitations. Text messages make it even more challenging due the very limited length one message can have. In addition, the social context should be understood and communications should respect local norms.
Organisations should be aware of the fact that it could be difficult to ensure that the person receiving a personalised message is actually the person targeted (particularly in cultures where sharing a phone is a common habit). In these cases it might be better to use alternative methods of communications.
