17% of American adults with a personal cell phone said that at one time their cell phone bill increased suddenly from one month to the next, even though they had not changed their calling or texting plans.
88% said their cell phone company did not contact them after their bill suddenly increased.
84% said their cell carrier did not contact them when they were about to exceed their allowed minutes, text messages, or data downloads.
For those with personal cell phones, 54% said they would have to pay an ETF and 18% did not know whether they would have to pay a fee.You can find the complete report at FCC
For home broadband customers, 21% said they would have to pay an ETF and 38% did not know if they would have to pay a fee.
Sources said several large media companies, including Time Warner and NBC Universal, told Apple they won't retool their extensive video libraries to accommodate the iPad, arguing that such a reformatting would be expensive and not worth it because Flash dominates the Web.
n addition, one media executive pointed out that Apple's ability to dictate terms to the media giants will be weakened further by Google TV, a software product that enables viewers to watch online video on their big-screen TVs.Steve Jobs does not like flash and there was a lot of back and forth discussions about Flash on Apple mobile platforms.
"When we started Facebook, we built it around a few simple ideas," said Zuckerberg. "When people have control over what they share, they want to share more. When people share more, the world becomes more open and connected. Over the past few weeks, the number one thing we've heard is that many users want a simpler way to control their information. Today we're starting to roll out changes that will make our controls simpler and easier."" CEO Mark Zuckerberg.Facebook Privacy controls have been made simple;
One control for content: A new simple control makes it easy to share on Facebook with friends, friends of friends or everyone—all with just one click. The corresponding settings are immediately applied and displayed in an easy-to-understand grid. At the same time, Facebook has maintained its more granular settings for those who want to customize their level of sharing. These settings now all appear on a single page for easier access.Facebook via Techcrunch
Retroactive control: People who choose the more restrictive "Friends Only" or "Friends of Friends" options with the simple control will have the corresponding setting for all the content they posted previously for sharing. Thus, a person can make all the content they've ever shared on Facebook more private with just a couple of clicks.
Future products: Facebook commits to carry over people's privacy choices for new products that facilitate sharing. Thus, if someone chooses "Friends Only" for "Sharing on Facebook," new products that have privacy settings will be automatically set to "Friends Only." This means Facebook users don't have to worry about new settings in the future.
Prioritizing simplicity: Granularity of control has always been a primary objective in Facebook's privacy design. Starting with the changes announced today, the company will also prioritize ease-of-use in its privacy design.
Fewer privacy changes: Facebook's goal is to make privacy-related changes with less frequency and to work within the framework announced today as it continues to innovate new features and products.
President of Foxconn Terry Gou bows for apology after a string of suicides by the company's employees at a plant of Taiwan-based Foxconn Technology Group in Shenzhen, south China's Guangdong Province, on May 26, 2010. Terry Gou said here on Wednesday that the company would prevent such tragedies from happening again. Foxconn is part of Taiwan's Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. and makes computers, game consoles and mobile phones for companies including Hewlett-Packard Co., Sony Corp. and Nokia Corp. (Xinhua/Chen Yehua).Shanghaiist
BRUSSELS, May 25 /PRNewswire/ -- Voxbone, a leading provider of telephone numbers to communications service providers and businesses worldwide, today announced that Rebtel's new iPhone application brings one-click dialing to its iNum® numbers by allowing users to generate a local phone number that will map to an iNum for any contact in their address book directly from their handset. As a result, people will be able to call iNums – with no access number or PIN to remember – by clicking on a contact icon from over 50 countries for the cost of a local call.
Through its partnership with Voxbone, Rebtel facilitates low-cost international calling by providing users with a local phone number in the country where they live which they can use to connect them with friends, family or work colleagues who live abroad. Rebtel delivers the more expensive international leg of the call over the internet using VoIP, at significantly lower rates than those typically charged by operators. Rebtel's newly launched iPhone application offers a simpler alternative to Rebtel's traditional setup mechanism, in which customers generate local number for their contacts via the Web and manually load them into their phones.
iNum is a different type of global phone number that is not tied to a particular location. Taking advantage of the +883 country code allocated by the ITU, iNums are allocated for free to Internet telephony providers that enable IP communications services to be accessed via traditional fixed or mobile networks. Many VoIP services still use private alphanumeric identities like those for IM or e-mail. iNum provides an ITU-approved e.164 number that is expressly intended for global use with VoIP applications, and enables users to make and receive free or low-cost mobile VoIP calls within participating networks, such as those of Rebtel, Truphone and Gizmo5."Here at Rebtel, we immediately bought into Voxbone's concept of an 'area code for Earth,' as it clearly matches our own vision of making all phone calls local, turning the world into a friendlier place and bringing people closer together," commented Andreas Bernstrom, CEO of Rebtel. "We're proud to be an active member of the iNum community and to be providing a hassle-free way of dialing an iNum for the cost of a local call."Rod Ullens, CEO and co-founder of Voxbone, added:
"Voxbone's goal is to further extend and grow the community of providers who deliver calls to iNums for free or for the cost of a local call. We're very pleased to see Rebtel making iNums reachable from over 50 countries and are delighted to have them on board."To see a video tutorial of how the Rebtel service works, go to http://www.rebtel.com/en/Learn/
FBI also advised how to best protect oneself;online trading and other money management accounts are being accessed by the perpetrators who are transferring funds out of those accounts. The perpetrators will obtain account information of their victims in some way and then contact the financial institutions to change their victims’ profile information such as email addresses, telephone numbers and bank account numbers. The purpose of the malicious phone calls is to occupy the victim phone numbers on record with the financial institutions managing the accounts so that when the institutions contact the victim to verify the changes and transactions, the institution is unable to reach the victim. Consequently, the victim has no idea what has really transpired until it’s too late.
Following is the complete press release from FBI;“Although unsolicited telephone calls are not always representative of fraud, the FBI believes it is important to advise the public of this scheme,” said Michael B. Ward, Special Agent In Charge of the FBI’s Newark division. “Consumers should continue to emphasize strong security procedures for all financial accounts, including placing fraud alerts on all of their financial accounts and with the major credit bureaus if they believe they may have been targeted by a TDOS attack or other form of fraud.” Passwords for online and telephonic banking should be changed regularly and frequently. People should obtain their credit report annually and review it for fraudulent activity.
For Immediate Release
May 11, 2010FBI Newark
Contact: Special Agent Bryan L. Travers
(973) 792-3020NEWARK, NJ—Have you recently received a large number of strange and unexplained calls on your mobile or landline telephones? The FBI is warning consumers about a new scheme that uses telecommunications denial-of-service attacks as a diversion to what is really happening: the looting of bank and online trading accounts.
The Scheme
The scheme is known as telephony denial-of–service (TDOS) and according to several telecommunications companies working with the FBI, there has been a recent surge of these attacks in the past few weeks. The perpetrators are suspected of using automated dialing programs and multiple accounts to overwhelm the land and cell phone lines of their victims with thousands of calls. When the calls are answered, the victim may hear anything from dead air (nothing on the other end), an innocuous recorded message, an advertisement, or even a telephone sex menu. The calls are typically short in duration but so numerous that victims have had to have their numbers changed to make the calls stop.
The FBI has determined that these calls serve as a diversionary technique. During these TDOS attacks, online trading and other money management accounts are being accessed by the perpetrators who are transferring funds out of those accounts. The perpetrators will obtain account information of their victims in some way and then contact the financial institutions to change their victims’ profile information such as email addresses, telephone numbers and bank account numbers. The purpose of the malicious phone calls is to occupy the victim phone numbers on record with the financial institutions managing the accounts so that when the institutions contact the victim to verify the changes and transactions, the institution is unable to reach the victim. Consequently, the victim has no idea what has really transpired until it’s too late.
What is Being Done About It?
The FBI first learned of this scheme through one of its partnerships with private industry. In November of 2009, a semi-retired dentist in St. Augustine lost as much as $400,000 from his retirement account through telephony DOS. (See the article at http://staugustine.com/node/5477.) Law enforcement discovered VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) accounts created by a single user that paired the accounts with automatic dialing tools to dial a large volume of computer-generated calls per minute, all directed toward the business, home, and mobile telephone numbers of the victim dentist. Those VOIP accounts were terminated, but the perpetrators of the scheme were never identified. AT&T, which has a strong working relationship with the FBI, enlisted the help of FBI Newark’s Cybercrime squad.“Following that first incident in November 2009, we’ve recently seen an increase in this activity targeting our customers across the country,” said Adam Panagia, Associate Director of Global Fraud Management for AT&T.Last month, the Communication Fraud Control Association (CFCA) invited the FBI to become its official law enforcement liaison. Headquartered in Roseland, New Jersey, the idea of the CFCA was conceived in February of 1985 when a group of communications security professionals from AT&T, ITT, MCI, Network One, SBS, and Sprint met to establish a cooperative effort to combat the growing problem of communications fraud. CFCA has since expanded its membership to include all areas of communication providers (such as AT&T, PAETEC, and Verizon to name a few) and end users and even includes members of law enforcement. The FBI and CFCA are now working together to analyze the patterns and trends of TDOS to prevent attacks, educate the public, and ultimately identify the perpetrators and bring them to justice. “The cooperation between PAETEC and the FBI has been tremendous,” said Robert Moore, CIO at PAETEC, a business communications firm headquartered in Fairpoint, New York.
“It’s only with a true partnership between service providers and law enforcement that we can make a real impact in protecting businesses and private citizens from the growing criminal threats we’ve been seeing over the past years. It’s also the reason that for more than ten years, we’ve employed a highly-trained team of voice security professionals to identify and stop these attacks in progress while working with law enforcement to protect customers.”
Victims don’t immediately think to contact law enforcement because to them, the numerous phone calls appear to be a technical issue with the telephone carrier and not a criminal threat. “With the advent of Voice over IP and the newest technologies in phone service, criminal attacks on businesses using those platforms have become increasingly sophisticated,” said Moore. One trend that the FBI sees with the malicious phone calls is that when they are answered, many of the victims report hearing a recorded advertisement for an American car company with an announcer having an Asian accent. The other prominent trend is hearing a telephone sex “menu” when answering one of these calls.
How to Protect Yourself
Protection from TDOS attacks requires consumers to be proactive. “Although unsolicited telephone calls are not always representative of fraud, the FBI believes it is important to advise the public of this scheme,” said Michael B. Ward, Special Agent In Charge of the FBI’s Newark division. “Consumers should continue to emphasize strong security procedures for all financial accounts, including placing fraud alerts on all of their financial accounts and with the major credit bureaus if they believe they may have been targeted by a TDOS attack or other form of fraud.” Passwords for online and telephonic banking should be changed regularly and frequently. People should obtain their credit report annually and review it for fraudulent activity.
Adam Panagia of AT&T offered this advice: “We urge anyone who suspects they may be the target of a TDOS attack to immediately contact their telephone provider after notifying their financial institutions.”
This notification should include online trading brokers with whom the victim may have an account. In one recent case, the victim acted early and alerted her financial institutions and was able to successfully thwart an attempt to have money stolen from her accounts. The incident should also be promptly reported to the FBI through www.ic3.gov, the FBI’s online cybercrime complaint center. (The FBI does not necessarily respond to individual complaints registered on ic3.gov. Rather, the information is used to look for trends and patterns. Once those patterns are identified, the victims may be contacted for further information.)
- Listen to related podcast
"As we get closer to readiness, we'll reveal a full list, but for now have started with the most popular models like HTC Desire [in the UK] and Droid Incredible [in the US] as well as some of the hotly anticipated new phones.Pocket-Lint
Features include:Looks like something I need!
✔ Seamlessly manage multiple Twitter accounts
✔ Explore and save Twitter Searches and Trending Topics
✔ Browse Twitter Lists, share your location by Geotagging your updates
✔ Facebook support
✔ Ping.fm support that lets you update dozens of social networks at the same time (including MySpace, Wordpress, Tumblr, LinkedIn, Flickr, Blogger, and many more!)
✔ Store updates into Evernote
✔ Post to multiple accounts at the same time
✔ Share photos to the photo sharing service of your choice
✔ Tons of other great features!
"The interoperability of fax-over-IP has been a priority for the SIP Forum for some time, and the i3 Forum has had a similar focus," said Richard Shockey, SIP Forum Chairman of the Board. "The partnership is a natural one and we expect it to yield tangible results in the near future as FoIP becomes a universally deployed telecom application in next-generation IP-based networks."
"A key objective of this partnership is to create a global coalition of stakeholders in the telecom community - operators, researchers, engineers and equipment vendors - and work together to better address FoIP technology issues in order to speed its deployment in IP network environments," said Philippe Millet, Chairman, i3 Forum. "Collectively we will work to develop concrete proposals and recommended solutions."
Updated to Provide a link to TV meets web. Web meets TV. 
While many TV solutions haphazrdly put together exists today, Google TV combines the entire Web and all available TV content in one place, with one interface – eliminating the need to toggle back and forth between multiple screens. Logitech and Sony have stepped up to the plate to deliver set top boxes for the service, for now. But I expect to see many more joining the effort. We too are excited about google TV but here is the press release by Logitech.“We are very proud to be working with this distinguished set of partners, all of whom have decades of experience in hardware, design and retail.”
“I am delighted to announce the unique alignment of Google’s rapidly growing, open source Android platform with Sony’s unparalleled expertise in the field of TV design and technology. The addition of ‘Sony Internet TV’ will further bolster Sony’s comprehensive TV lineup and will fuse new levels of enjoyment and interactivity into the TV experience.”
“We committed to Google TV early on because it aligns with our strategy to support open platforms that enable new immersive experiences in the digital living room. While Google TV enables seamless discovery of all your content, Logitech enables seamless control over how you experience that content. We look forward to continued collaboration with Google and the developer community to create new Google TV experiences that have yet to be imagined.”
“Google TV marks the next evolution in television, and we are excited to be the first to partner with Google to bring this experience to our customers. Only DISH Network Google TV customers will be able to enjoy a unified search across TV, DVR and web; easily find related content; and manage their entire TV viewing experience. Additionally, the advanced integration will allow developers to create new and exciting applications to enrich the TV viewing experience.”
“Every day, our 180,000 Blue Shirt store employees and Geek Squad Agents work with our customers to get them the best home theater experience possible”, said Brian Dunn, CEO Best Buy, “We are thrilled about the new and exciting experiences smart TVs, like Google TV, provide to our customers - and we are looking forward to showcasing those experiences in our store and ensuring customers get connected to all the products and services that bring those experiences to life.”
“An open web ecosystem offers endless opportunities for creativity and innovation. Flash Player 10.1 extends the advantages of full web browsing and consistent, rich experiences to smartphones, tablets, netbooks and Internet-connected TVs. We’re thrilled to be part of the Google TV initiative with other industry leaders who share a common vision of enabling access to the best web experiences possible.”
Find our more on Google TV and learn how to make web apps and Android apps.
Everything Channel Names the Winners of the Midsize Enterprise Summit East's 'Midmarket Innovation Awards' and 'Midmarket Value Product Awards'Apr 21, 2010BOCA RATON, Fla., April 21 /PRNewswire/ -- Everything Channel, a UBM company, today announced the winners of Midsize Enterprise Summit East's 'Midmarket Innovation Awards' and the 'Midmarket Value Product Awards.' The awards are a proven springboard to increased brand awareness and product credibility in the midmarket.
The 'Midmarket Innovation Awards' are the only awards in the midmarket industry targeted to IT executives which are voted on solely by the attending IT decision-makers who directly influence their customers' technology buying decisions. After two days of boardroom presentations and one-on-one meetings, the decision-makers vote on the products and services presented at the show.
The winners of the 'Midmarket Innovation Awards' include:
- Best Midmarket Solution – Hardware: HP Intel
- Best Midmarket Solution – Software: Qlikview
- Best Midmarket Solution – Services: Google
- Best Execution of a Midmarket IT Solution: Trigeo
- Best Presentation: Trigeo
- Best of Show: HP Intel
The Midsize Enterprise Summit created a new awards program for the 2010 event named the 'Midmarket Value Product Awards.' The awards highlight the top ten products recognized by CRN Magazine across five categories, including networking, data center, storage, security, and productivity applications that have been successful with VARs and CIOs in the midmarket market.
Midmarket Value Product Award Winners:
- Security: TriGeo Network Security Information Management (SIM) Version 5
- Productivity Apps: IBM Cognos Express
- Data Center: Vmware ESXi vSphere4
- Storage: Compellent Storage Center 5
- Networking: Digium AA355 Switchvox PBX
Midmarket Value Product Award Finalists:
- Storage: Dell Equalogic PS Series
- Security: Kaspersky Mobile 8.0
- Networking: LifeSize 220 Series Telepresence
- Productivity Apps: Intuit QuickBooks Enterprise Solutions
- Data Center: Riverbed Technology Steelhead WAN Optimization Appliances
The Midmarket Value Product winners and runner-ups were selected via a nomination process involving CRN's editorial staff, solution providers and CIOs of midsize organizations. Selections were based on customer service, how well the vendor's technology fit a midsize enterprise and the vendor's commitment to solution providers serving midmarket customers.
"Our awards programs embrace innovation and success for technology companies in the midmarket," said Nancy Hammervik, Senior Vice President of Everything Channel Events. "We congratulate the winners on their success."
The awards were presented at the Summit held April 18-21 at the Boca Raton Resort. The Midsize Enterprise Summit, which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, brought senior IT executives from midsize businesses together with industry analysts and leading and emerging vendors. The event embraced midmarket-specific issues, trends and solutions from a horizontal and vertical industry-specific perspective. The business intensive format includes analyst-led sessions, vendor-led World Premiers, Private Boardroom Appointments, a Showcase of Exhibits, as well as networking functions.
For additional information on the Midsize Enterprise Summit East, visit: http://www.everythingchannelevents.com/mese10.
Death and Repudiation License http://snapvoip.blogspot.com/It is sometimes nice to be able to laugh about software licenses. Among thousands of open source licenses, the following stands out very well. The software under following license is only usable by dead (and living too under a different license). I think to prove the point the website software producer is dead today or only accessible by dead. I could not. Here is a link to the codebase of Syck (a PHP extension for swiftly parsing YAML), see if it is worth dieing for. If not you can use the software under BSD license.
D&R (Death and Repudiation) License===================================This software may not be used directly by any living being. ANY use of thissoftware (even perfectly legitimate and non-commercial uses) until after deathis explicitly restricted. Any living being using (or attempting to use) this softwarewill be punished to the fullest extent of the law.For your protection, corpses will not be punished. We respectfully requestthat you submit your uses (revisions, uses, distributions, uses, etc.) toyour children, who may vicariously perform these uses on your behalf. Ifyou use this software and you are found to be not dead, you will be punishedto the fullest extent of the law.If you are found to be a ghost or angel, you will be punished to the fullestextent of the law.After your following the terms of this license, the author has vowed to repudiateyour claim, meaning that the validity of this contract will no longer be recognized.This license will be unexpectedly revoked (at a time which is designated to bemost inconvenient) and involved heirs will be punished to the fullest extentof the law.Furthermore, if any parties (related or non-related) escape the punishmentsoutlined herein, they will be severely punished to the fullest extent of a newrevised law that (1) expands the statement "fullest extent of the law" to encompassan infinite duration of infinite punishments and (2) exacts said punishmentsupon all parties (related or non-related).
More than being free and open, WEBM project and it's technologies like VP8 Video codec, Vorbis Audio Codec are backed by industry giants like Google, Mozilla, Opera, Adobe, and many others who are also part of IP Telephony community.
