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AT&T Supplying LTE Micro-SIM Cards to Retail Stores; Hints at 4G LTE iPhone And iPad 3?

Administrator — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 17:42:45 +0000

reports that according to a tipster, AT&T retail stores have recently received LTE-compatible micro-SIM cards.
AT&T has notified the retail stores to scrap all old micro-SIM cards and replace them with the new LTE-compatible micro-SIM cards.
, which is expected to be unveiled at a special event in the first week of March could support 4G LTE Networks.
According to Phone Arena, one possible reason for the change of micro-SIM cards could be due to the launch of Lumia 900 next month, but they’re also speculating that it could be also be meant for Apple ‘s next generation iPhone , which is expected to support 4G LTE networks.
With the launch of iPad 3 next month, it is possible that AT&T is gearing up for it. The 4G LTE support would also explain why it could come with a
.

iPhone Bug Allows FaceTime Calls Even With Passcode Lock

Administrator — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 14:42:21 +0000

person, in possession of your passcode protected
with voice dialing deactivated, make FaceTime calls and view certain fields of your contacts from the lock screen.
The hack, which was discovered by Canadian tech writer Ade Barkah, exploits the Emergency Dialer accessible via the lockscreen to accomplish this task.
“Slide to unlock” on the lockscreen, and instead of entering the passcode, hit the “Emergency Call” button to get the emergency dialer.
Now long press the home button to bring up Voice Control and try to FaceTime with any of your contacts.
The call goes through, and you’ll be able to FaceTime with a person from your locked phone.
Even if a person in your contact list doesn’t have FaceTime set up, you can see the contact’s image on the screen.
Although the same process could be replicated for voice calling a person, the voice call doesn’t actually go through, but it could be used to reveal other information as explained below.
The loophole could be used to see certain details of a contact by a hit and trial method. For instance, you have two entries for a contact named “Bob,” and you tell Voice Control to “Call Bob,” it would present the full names of both Bobs. Similarly if a contact has two phone numbers, with one of the phone numbers filed under a custom field, Voice Control would present both these fields (not the number), which could potentially leak private information.
This isn’t a very serious flaw, though. For starters the phone would need to be connected to a Wi-Fi network. If it is, the person in possession of your phone would need to have some knowledge of your address book. And since the problem is only with Voice Control and not Siri, majority of iPhone 4S users won’t be affected. (Only when
is disabled, does Voice Control show up.)
It is a bug nonetheless, and Apple would most likely fix this in the
.
Ade has, in the past, discovered
which make information that should ideally be private, accessible via the lock screen.
Does this sound like a security threat to you?

Apple to Unveil iPad 3 in First Week of March

Administrator — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 10:47:29 +0000

has just reported that Apple will be holding an event in the first week of March to release the highly anticipated next generation iPad.
Sources say the company has chosen the first week in March to debut the successor to the iPad 2, and will do so at one of its trademark special events. The event will be held in San Francisco, presumably at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Apple ’s preferred location for big announcements like these.
Paczkowski doesn’t know the date of the special event, but expects iPad 3 to be available a week or so after the event.
According to his source, iPad 3 will have a similar form factor as iPad 2, come with a much faster chip, an improved graphics processing unit (GPU), and featuring a 2048×1536 Retina Display, which is in-line with the rumors we’ve heard recently.
has been quite a reliable source when it comes to Apple related information.
It remains to be seen if 2012 will be the year of iPad 3.

Apple Releases Two New iPhone 4S Ads Featuring Siri

Administrator — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 08:00:34 +0000

Unlock For iPhone 3GS, iPhone 3G On iOS 4.2.1 Released [Updated]
posted on November 28, 2010
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posted on February 6, 2011
How To Perform Untethered Jailbreak On Your iPhone 4/3GS Without Updating Baseband Using Redsn0w For iOS 5.0.1 [Updated]
posted on December 27, 2011
How To Jailbreak iPod Touch 3G, iPod Touch 4G Using Limera1n [Windows]
posted on October 10, 2010
How To Perform Untethered Jailbreak On Your iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS Running iOS 5.0.1 Using Redsn0w
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How To Downgrade iPhone 3G From iOS 4 To iPhone OS 3.1.3
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Apple Makes it Mandatory For iPhone App Developers to Submit Retina Display Screenshots

Administrator — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 06:49:06 +0000

while submitting them to the App Store.
Prior to this, developers could upload images for Retina Display, but it was not a mandatory requirement.
When you create or update your apps in iTunes Connect, you must upload screenshots that are high-resolution. We require your screenshots as high-resolution images so that your app is optimized for the Retina display.
The requirements for high-resolution images are 960 x 640, 960 x 600, 640 x 960, or 640 x 920 pixels. Images must be at least 72 dpi, in the RGB color space, and the file must be .jpeg, .jpg, .tif, .tiff, or .png. You can update your screenshot files at any time in iTunes Connect.
Developers need to meet this new requirement even when they submit an update for their existing apps. While this could well be a house-keeping exercise to ensure that the images in the App Store look good on iOS devices like iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S with Retina display, it has also led to
may not be around much longer.
We don’t agree. While we expect Apple to phase out iPhone 3GS when it launches the
, we don’t think Apple will stop supporting iPhone 3GS so soon. Also screenshots are used in the App Store and has no bearing on the support for a particular device.
What do you think?

Apple to Add Support For Chinese And Japanese To Siri Next Month?

Administrator — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 17:55:16 +0000

As you may know,
personal assistant feature can currently understand and speak in English (United States, United Kingdom, Australia), French (France), German (Germany).
that it plans to add support for Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Italian, and Spanish to Siri in 2012.
, Apple is planning to add support for Chinese to Siri next month. According to their sources, it is already undergoing internal testing this month.
In addition to understanding and speaking in Chinese, Apple will also add Maps and local search support for Siri in China, which should come as good news to users. Currently, Maps and local search support is available only to users in the U.S.
The rumor also contends that the Chinese version will only support the standard Mandarin (aka: putonghua) Chinese, which would leave out Cantonese-speaking people, as well as some Taiwan folk who effectively speak in a different dialect.
The report also claims that Apple will also add support for Japanese and Russian languages to Siri next month. Please note that DoNews does not have a track record when it comes to Apple related rumors so take this with a pinch of salt.

Path iPhone App Uploads Your Entire Address Book to Its Servers

Administrator — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 09:09:11 +0000

If you’re one of the 2 million users of Path – the personal life-sharing service, you might want to read this.
Singapore based developer and blogger Arun Thampi has discovered that Path’s slick iPhone app uploads your entire address book to its servers while he was trying to hack it to implement a Path Mac OS X app.
It all started innocently enough. I was thinking of implementing a Path Mac OS X app as part of our regularly scheduled hackathon. Using the awesome mitmproxy tool which was featured on the front page of Hacker News yesterday, I started to observe the various API calls made to Path’s servers from the iPhone app. It all seemed harmless enough until I observed a

https://api.path.com/3/contacts/add

.
Upon inspecting closer, I noticed that my entire address book (including full names, emails and phone numbers) was being sent as a plist to Path. Now I don’t remember having given permission to Path to access my address book and send its contents to its servers, so I created a completely new “Path” and repeated the experiment and I got the same result – my address book was in Path’s hands.
Path’s CEO and co-founder Dave Morin tried to address the concern raised by Thampi in the comments section, which has now also been updated in the blog post by Thampi.
Arun, thanks for pointing this out. We actually think this is an important conversation and take this very seriously. We upload the address book to our servers in order to help the user find and connect to their friends and family on Path quickly and effeciently as well as to notify them when friends and family join Path. Nothing more.
We believe that this type of friend finding & matching is important to the industry and that it is important that users clearly understand it, so we proactively rolled out an opt-in for this on our Android client a few weeks ago and are rolling out the opt-in for this in 2.0.6 of our iOS Client, pending App Store approval.
The major concern here is that the entire address book is being uploaded to Path’s servers without informing or taking an authorization from users.
points out that apps that typically use the address book, hash the data and save only the checksum rather than saving the entire data in plain text format on the servers. Morin has said that they would look at implementing the hashing procedure as that’s the industry best practice.
If you’re really spooked by this revelation then you can send a email to service@path.com and request them to delete your address book account from their servers.
We feel that though it was poor decision on Path’s part not to have the opt-in and the hashing procedure in place from the beginning, they have been extremely proactive and honest in dealing with the situation. It’s a young company and we’re sure that this incident will put privacy on the top of their priority list when they decide on which new features should be rolled out next.
in case of users who used their initial version, which did not take off).

Sprint Sold 1.8 Million iPhones Last Quarter; Of Which 40% Were to New Customers

Administrator — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 01:45:44 +0000

Sprint has just announced its financial results for the fourth quarter of 2011. Sprint reports that it sold 1.8 million iPhones in the last quarter, of which 40 percent were new customers.
for the first time in October.
a net loss of $1.3 billion, which was due to subsidy for wireless devices that increased to $1.7 billion from $1.3 billion due to the launch of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S. The company however viewed the iPhone launch as a success and expects to recover the costs in future quarters.
Apple ‘s iPhone featured quite a bit in Sprint’s financial results announcement. Here are some of the snippets:
Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE: S) today reported Adjusted OIBDA
of $842 million for the fourth quarter and nearly $5.1 billion for the full year 2011. Wireless service revenues for the fourth quarter increased more than 7 percent year-over-year, driven by Sprint platform postpaid ARPU growth of $3.69 – the largest year-over-year increase on record across the U.S. wireless industry. Strong revenue growth and cost management partially offset the impact of increased equipment net subsidies and sales expense associated with the successful launch of the iPhone
. Forty percent of Sprint’s 1.8 million iPhone sales in the fourth quarter were to new customers. Based on internal estimates, including incremental costs associated with iPhone sales, the combined impact of iPhone and Network Vision costs reduced fourth quarter Adjusted OIBDA* margin, which was 10.8 percent, by approximately 8.8 percentage points. [..]
Based on internal estimates, including incremental costs associated with iPhone sales, the combined impact of iPhone and Network Vision costs reduced fourth quarter Adjusted OIBDA* of $842 million by approximately $684 million. [..]
Approximately 9 percent of postpaid customers upgraded their handsets during the fourth quarter. Upgrades as a percentage of our subscriber base increased sequentially, likely due to the iPhone launch and customers’ expectations of the launch, which depressed third quarter upgrades. [..]
The quarterly year-over-year and sequential increase in net subsidy is primarily due to the launch of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S, which on average carry a higher subsidy rate per handset as compared to other handsets. [..]
The quarterly year-over-year decline in Adjusted OIBDA* was primarily due to higher equipment net subsidy and sales expense primarily associated with iPhone sales, and higher cost of service, partially offset by higher postpaid and prepaid wireless service revenues and lower marketing costs. Sequentially, quarterly Adjusted OIBDA* declined primarily as a result of higher equipment net subsidy and sales expense primarily associated with iPhone sales, partially offset by higher postpaid wireless service revenues and lower wireless cost of service. [..]
Dan Hesse, Sprint CEO had this to say about the results:
“Our strong fourth quarter performance illustrates the power of matching iconic devices like the iPhone with our simple, unlimited plans and industry-leading customer experience. During the past year, Sprint added more than 5 million net new customers and grew wireless service revenue by more than 5 percent, including 17 percent for the Sprint platform. This momentum gives us confidence as we execute our Network Vision upgrade and 4G LTE roll-out.”
Sprint is currently the only iPhone carrier in the U.S. that offers unlimited data plan. But it still has some catching up to do as
in the last quarter, while Verizon activated 4.3 million iPhones.
Did you switch to Sprint from another carrier? Tell us your experience in the comments below.

Samsung Galaxy Note Super Bowl Ad Mocks Apple Fans

Administrator — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 05:36:47 +0000

, Samsung has aired another TV ad as part of the
last night, which again pokes fun at Apple fans standing in the line for the new iPhone .
Unlike previous ad, which promoted
, this one promotes Samsung Galaxy Note, which features a 5.3 inch WXGA (1280 x 800) screen, 1.4GHz dual core processor, 16GB Internal memory + microSD (up to 32GB) and supports 4G LTE networks.
reports that Samsung head of marketing has acknowledged that Samsung is directly targeting Apple .
“Especially in U.S., people are obsessed with Apple ,” Lee said, in a lengthy interview at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this month. “It’s time to change people’s attention.”
What do you think about Samsung’s Galaxy Note Super Bowl ad? Do you think Samsung’s approach of mocking Apple fans and potentially their customers will work? Please share your views in the comments section below.

iPad 3 May Not Feature a Quad-Core Processor?

Administrator — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 03:30:02 +0000

, Apple ‘s
may feature a quad-core processor along with Retina Display, improved cameras and support for LTE networks.
will be powered by Apple ‘s next generation A6 chip, which will include a significantly more powerful GPU, it won’t be powered a quad-core processor.
According to people familiar with the product, though the new iPad will be touting that double resolution display — a true iPad Retina Display, clocking in at 2048 x 1536 — the device will be nearly physically identical to its predecessor, but the slate will be about one millimeter thicker overall. We’re also told that the A6 CPU the iPad 3 is likely to sport will include a significantly more powerful GPU — no big surprise there. What is surprising, however, is that our sources say that the A6 will not be a quad-core chip, but will remain dual-core. We’ve previously had heard that the device would have a quad-core CPU as well as an LTE cell radio on-board, but at least part of that story wasn’t accurate.
Apple is rumored to unveil iPad 3 at a special media event in March.
Will the lack of a quad-core processor be a deal breaker for you to upgrade or buy iPad 3?