Even if all of the above issues are addressed, significant consumer hurdles remain. Due to per-minute pricing, consumers are less willing to accept ads when they are paying for them. If carriers switch to a flat-fee pricing model, this barrier to mobile advertising would be eliminated. Currently, no means exist to identify interactive mobile users other than through their phone numbers, introducing a sticky privacy issue. Furthermore, geographic positioning data raises more issues of that type.
Consumers are resistant to the idea of advertisers knowing their location at all times.
Highlighting this concern is that fact that in most European countries, government regulation does not allow companies to collect positioning data without the permission of individual users. Any wireless-advertising pundit will paint a glowing picture of the possibilities offered by wireless advertising. Although this situation sounds ideal, wireless advertising is so limited at this time that the reality is nowhere near this imaginary world. Targeting based on users' geographic position is one of the most compelling promises of mobile advertising. However, targeting by geographic position requires carriers to supply geotargeting service to advertisers, and many of them remain unequipped to do so.