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  • CEOs Must Take Responsibility For Data Breaches


    A rapid rise in losses from giant databases highlights the need for tougher sanctions to deter such security breaches, according to a privacy watchdog.

    The UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is also calling on chief executives to take responsibility for the personal information their organisations hold.

    The number of data breaches reported to the ICO has soared to 277 in the past year.

    New figures, released today by the ICO, include 80 reported breaches by the private sector, 75 within the National Health Service and other health bodies, 28 reported by central government, 26 by local authorities and 47 by the rest of the public sector.

    The ICO is investigating 30 of the most serious cases.

    Richard Thomas, the Information Commissioner, said information can be a toxic liability and that accountability rests at the top.

    He said CEOs must make sure their organisations have the right policies and procedures in place.

    "It is alarming that despite high profile data losses, the threat of enforcement action, a plethora of reports on data handling and clear ICO guidance, the flow of data breaches and sloppy information handling continues," he said.

    "We have already seen examples where data loss or abuse has led to fake credit card transactions, witnesses at risk of physical harm or intimidation, offenders at risk from vigilantes, fake applications for tax credits, falsified Land Registry records and mortgage fraud.

    "Addresses of service personnel, police and prison officers and battered women have also been exposed. Sometimes lives may be at risk."

    Describing these breaches as "serious and worrying", Thomas said this was especially so because personal information is now the lifeblood of government and business.

    He said that as a result data protection has never been more important.

    "It is time for the penny to drop. The more databases that are set up and the more information exchanged from one place to another, the greater the risk of things going wrong," he said.

    "The more you centralise data collection, the greater the risk of multiple records going missing or wrong decisions about real people being made.

    "The more you lose the trust and confidence of customers and the public, the more your prosperity and standing will suffer.

    "Put simply, holding huge collections of personal data brings significant risks."

    Earlier this year, the UK Parliament decided that the ICO should have the power to impose substantial penalties for deliberate or reckless breaches.

    The ICO is working with the government to ensure this measure is implemented as soon as possible.

    It hopes that the threat and reality of substantial penalties will concentrate minds and act as a real deterrent.

  • iPhone Sets The Standard In China


    The iPhone may be made in China but Apple still hasn’t launched its game-changing handset there yet.

    That hasn’t stopped the 3G smartphone having a huge impact on China’s estimated 700 million cell phone market, according to the latest report from Research and Markets.

    It says that Apple’s iPhone has had a significant impact on the smartphone world generally, because of its user interface (UI), user experience (UE), and business model.

    And despite not being officially on sale in China, the report says it has also made a big impact on the smartphone market there as well.

    "The iPhone has set a standard for users’ expectation of entertainment smartphones, resulting in iPhone-like models appearing in the marketplace," the report states.

    Not surprisingly, it goes on to predict that this type of revolutionary UI/UE, enabled by a touchscreen, with acceleration and proximity sensors technologies will be a distinct trend in China’s entertainment smartphone market over the next two years.

    The report analyses Chinese consumer attitudes toward smartphones (including the iPhone) based on a web survey carried out in May 2008.

    Based on this analysis, the repsearch provides drivers and barriers for the Chinese smartphone market and smartphone shipment forecasts from 2008 to 2012.

  • Will Smartphones Be The Death of PNDs?

    With the market for personal navigation devices (PNDs) getting tougher and many smartphones now equipped with GPS, what does the future hold for the likes of TomTom and Garmin?


    Smartphone.biz-news.com asked Chris Jones, VP and principal analyst with Canalys, what direction mobile navigation was taking.

    Blackberry makers RIM recently predicted that GPS navigation solutions on smartphones meant death for sat-nav devices.

    The argument was that there is no need for specific devices for navigation when your mobile can do it for you.

    This received further credence from research by Strategy Analytics showing mobile navigation to be the primary service for which consumers in the US and Western Europe would be willing to pay a relatively high fee per month compared to other mobile services.

    With third quarter results out from both TomTom and Garmin this week – and forecasts being downgraded – the future is looking far from rosy.

    Chris Jones, VP and principal analyst with Canalys, said despite continued growth the PND market was tough and profitability was being squeezed as margins became increasingly tight.

    Both TomTom and Garmin are expected to benefit from aggressive price promotions to hold – and even increase – their market share at the expense of smaller competitors.

    But he said the trend was towards more sales at the lower end of the market than was the case 12 months ago.

    Chris Jones, VP and principal analyst, Canalys

    This was going to force down margins as big volume sales slipped to lower tier devices.

    As well as reducing profitability, Jones said the downside to this was that consumer perception becomes accustomed to GPS prices being lower.

    Buyers then become unwilling to pay extra for higher end products.

    "The big threat is to the margins and profitability of the PND market," he said. "Some vendors have exited the market and we will see others leave in the future."

    Smartphones Challenge PNDs

    To add to the PND industry’s woes there was increasing availability of navigation solutions on smartphones and mobile phones.

    Apple and Nokia have both done much to promote navigation services, with the Finnish giant leading the charge in Europe.

    Nokia expects to sell an estimated 35 million GPS smartphones this year, all equipped with maps and the upgrade option of navigation.

    Jones said the challenge for Nokia was to increase the activation rate.

    "Nokia has the ability to try and accelerate these rates by making it easier to do," he said. "Prices will come down and the free periods offered will lengthen."

    Hope Remains For PNDs

    However, Jones said despite the rise of smartphone navigation options, PNDs still had a future.

    He believes form is still likely to favor PND’s as the navigation device of choice in cars.

    "With smartphones you are looking at a small screen, you can’t touch the device, in many cases there’s no touchscreen or voice activation," he said. "The user interface is not ideal when you are driving.

    "The PND is better in the car but the smartphone is one device that is always with you."

    Work To Be Done With Smartphones

    Out of the car, Jones said more had to be done to inform users about when best to use GPS on smartphones.

    He said there wasn’t any great additional cost to add the technology but it had to be well implemented.

    "People need to understand when GPS will work and where they are not likely to get a fix," he said. "I think that has a lot to do with education and integrating technology into handsets – more sensitive GPS devices that work deeper indoors because invariably the fix is too long."

    Taking five minutes to get a fix – as was the case with some handsets – would do nothing to endear consumers to the technology.

    "It’s not good enough to just put GPS in a handset," he said. "It has to work well in small spaces, with the components that are in there."

    Jones said he expected all smartphones to come with GPS within three years and it would also begin to appear in more lower spec cell phones.

    Whether this, and the continued evolution of smartphone technology, will signal the death of PNDs remains to be seen.

    Please let us know your comments on where the mobile navigation market is going.

  • Consumers Driving Indian HDTV Market


    Growth of The HDTV Market In India

    The general trends in the HDTV market shows that this will probably swell up to 78% as most of the consumers are planning to replace their old television sets with the HDTVs.

    Moreover, this fact is supported by the survey conducted in United States by “Hitachi America”.

    The expansion prospective of the HDTV market in India is equally promising. People, who earn a decent income per month, feel that this can be a proud possession for them and it is fine to pay a good amount as the quality of picture and other facilities associated with it are simply great.

    The surveys revealed the fact that 85% of the people with an annual income of more than Rs. 14.3 lakhs and about 70% of those with the annual earnings of less than Rs.14.3 lakhs are keenly interested in purchasing a HDTV.

    • What are the triggers to success?

    The secret to success of the HDTV market in India depends mainly on the intense desire of the consumers.

    In fact, the women are keener about getting these high definition televisions just like the other consumer durable products.

    They are the ones who take interest and spend ample time to browse the HDTVs available in the market from various companies.

    About 73% women and 51% men take interest in knowing more about the televisions and the specs.

    The functionality and designs of the HDTVs are very much important to acquire the huge market in India.

    In fact this is a general trend that the larger would be the TV screens, the more consumers will be enticed. In fact people are often ready to go beyond their budget to purchase a HDTV with bigger screen.

    • What are the barriers to entry?

    Though the HDTV market in India is quite promising but still there are a few barriers to be conquered.

    First of all, most of the consumers are not much aware of the difference among the available HDTV options.

    In fact, most of the customers do not have any idea what are the different technologies used in the DLP, Plasma and LCD televisions-they feel all of them are same and the features are similar as well.

    This is a complete wrong notion and the brands who wish to avail the huge market in India should put some light on this fact.

    Secondly, some of the buyers are prevented from buying these televisions because of the high price range compared to the normal televisions.

    Some of the local brands sell their products at a very reasonable price and this is why people take more interest in their goods.

    • What does a company need to do to be successful in these markets in India?

    Well calculated strategies are really important to capture the large HDTV market.

    The companies need to educate the buyers and let them know more about the technology, specs and other intricacies of the HDTVs.

    Now only the women but the men should also take equal interest in it.

    This is a great idea to provide as many features as possible keeping the price tag nominal.

    This is a competition market and the companies need to target on larger sales than making large profit from each sale.

    Quality of the products is definitely important and for this they should keep updating the technology and features on a frequent basis.

  • Netflix "Watch Instantly" Comes To Macs


    Online movie rental giant Netflix is finally offering Mac users its instant watching service.

    Windows users have been able to watch movies and TV episodes instantly since early 2007.

    The upgraded service will initially only work on Macs with Intel chips – but the Los Gatos, California-based online DVD rental pioneer said that was around 70 per cent of their Mac subscribers.

    It requires Microsoft’s Silverlight software and Mac users will have to download a Silverlight player to access Netflix’s extensive streaming library.

    The deployment is the first step in an anticipated roll-out of the new platform to all Netflix subscribers by the end of the year.

    It is expected that Netflix members who watch content instantly on their computers will enjoy a faster, easier connection and a more robust viewing experience with Silverlight.

    Among the viewing enhancements with the new player is a breakthrough in timeline navigation that vastly improves the use of fast-forwarding and rewinding.

    The new Netflix player takes advantage of PlayReady DRM, which is built into Silverlight, for the playback of protected content on both Windows-based PCs and on Macs.

    That had not been possible with previous generation technologies.

  • HD Option A Big Hit For MyToons

    MyToons only launched its high definition channel a few months ago but already it’s attracting attention from several major TV and film studios.
    Paul Ford, president of the animation website, spoke to HDTV.biz-news.com about the burgeoning HD animation community and the challenges of offering high def cartoons on the internet.

    It’s one thing to stick a home-movie onto YouTube, quite another to create animation in high definition.

    Yet just a few months after launching its HD channel the cutting-edge animation site MyToons has become the leading showcase for high def cartoons.

    Paul Ford, MyToons’ president, said the number of HD uploads was growing rapidly and he expected that to continue as increasing numbers of animators presented their work.

    He described the quality and detail of the HD creations as mind-blowing.

    "People are taking to HD like mad," he said. "It’s been very well-received by both the animators and the fans. In fact, we’ve had calls from several major TV and film studios looking to licence the technology."

    Making animations in HD presents its own challenges

    Ford said there was a big difference between making online user-created video and animated content.

    He said creating YouTube-style content – with a handy cam or camcorder – was not really that difficult to do.

    "You think up a story or a bit, run around and shoot some stuff, maybe edit it in a consumer editor like Movie Maker or iMovie, and you’re done," he said.

    But Ford believed creating animated content, on any level, was much more difficult.

    "To create animation – and I mean any kind of animation, generally – there is far more thought, and far more preparation and planning involved," he said.

    "Usually the story comes first, and that takes time to develop. Next are the dialogue and music tracks, story boards and possibly animatics (animated storyboards).
    "Finally, after a lot more work creating the final piece, you are done."

    Ford said in between was many hours of tedious work drawing in 2D, modelling in 3D, creating backgrounds and props and crafting each frame of each scene.

    "This art does take a good amount of time to create. Much longer than user-created video, for sure," he said. "Creating animation in HD really takes things up yet another notch.

    "Not only does the animator need to think about and do all of the stuff I’ve already discussed, they need computers with the horse power to do it at HD resolution. This means long render times and huge files."

    Technology Delivers Online Cartoons

    Ford described the MyToons HD player technology as "second to none", adding that it wasn’t necessary to download a proprietary player as was the case with some of the non-animation HD video sites.

    But to get to the stage of being able to stream HD via the internet MyToons first had to do some "very, very tricky things".

    "Our HD is not progressive. In other words, a person is not downloading the file first, or a portion of it, and then able to view the file," he said.

    "MyToons HD is more like real television. You hit play, and it starts right up. Our player is able to read the HD data in realtime, giving the viewer that ‘instant-on’ experience they are used to."

    Based in San Antonio, Texas, MyToons was established in 2006 as an online resource and entertainment destination for professional animators, students, artists and animation fans.

    The attraction for animators or creators of having their work on MyToons is that it offers them a robust and reliable distribution platform at the quality level they expect, according to Ford.

    "Animators are finicky when it comes to quality," he said. "That’s why many, many animators I talk to regularly simply won’t put their stuff up on places like YouTube.

    "That work is usually so personal and so carefully crafted-to-perfection – it’s really seen by the creator as a direct reflection, of sorts, of themselves – and usually a labor of love.

    "Giving animators everywhere the ability to have their work experienced as they intended and envisioned is very powerful stuff."

    HD Audience Growing

    In August, MyToons announced a global partnership to bring its animated content to Vuze’s 30 million member worldwide audience.

    Setting up such partner channels was a means of giving independent animators even greater reach and more exposure.

    "We will continue with these partnerships because they are good for our members, and we always put the animator first – what’s good for them, is good for MyToons," said Ford.

    "We think that these channels add to MyToons, and don’t take away from it. We find many people coming directly from those channels to MyToons-proper to get more of the good stuff."

  • Dialling INTO Your Smartphone To Get Easier


    Hundreds of millions of people have used Virtual Network Computing’s (VNC) remote access applications on their PCs.

    The Cambridge, UK-based company is now counting on the same success with its mobile version of allowing remote control both to and from smartphones.

    Speaking to smartphone.biz-news.com at the Smartphone Show in London, Andy Harter, CEO of VNC, said he expected the mobile edition to appeal to both IT departments and to consumers.

    With increasing numbers of employees now equipped with high-end handsets, he said the mobile viewer could be used for solving technical difficulties for staff in the field.

    The viewer could also give staff access to their office desktop machines if they needed to locate data not available on their handsets.

    Supporting all the major mobile platforms, including Symbian, Windows Mobile, Blackberry, iPhone and Mobile Linux, VNC Mobile provides cross-platform compatibility.

    Available in early 2009, no cost is yet available but Harter said the viewer would be priced sensibly.

    He said the applications could also be available on feature phones at some time in the near future.

  • Symbian Vows To Sweep Clear Obstacles For Developers


    Symbian’s CEO Nigel Clifford spelt out his vision for the organisation’s future under Nokia as one which would sweep away previous obstacles and attract innovative developers.

    Giving the opening keynote speech at the Smartphone Show in London, Clifford admitted that up until now developers may have been put off working with Symbian because of licensing agreements and conditions.

    He promised that would be among the “double quick” changes that would be made when the deal by Nokia to purchase Symbian goes through next year.

    “We will take a popular operating system and user interfaces and create a new platform with a new identity,” he said.

    This would solve the conundrum that, according to Clifford, people had been faced with:  " We have so far lived in an either/or world where you can either have free code but with a small footprint – or you can have very capable, proven software but at a cost.

    “With Symbian we are moving from that to both ‘and’ – proven in the market place and for free.”

    Sporting a broken arm from a cycling accident, Clifford said the result of this would be that there would no longer need to be a trade-off in developers’ minds.

    He said the cost and effort would be taken out of the development track and a unified asset created.

    “We are sweeping the hurdles away so we can get on with the job at hand,” he said.

    Earlier, David Wood, executive vice president of research at Symbian, also stressed where the organisation’s emphasis would lie once the deal with Nokia was completed.

    “There are three words that are most important for the success of the Symbian platform going forward: developers, developers and developers,” he said.

  • Why Halt At Tethering One Device To Your Smartphone?


    It’s one thing to hear the corporate blurb about a product, quite another to hear company executives’ experience of using their own gear.

    Sean O’Leary, TapRoot Systems’ VP of marketing and business development, has just spent a week touring Europe relying on his company’s WalkingHotSpot software for internet connectivity.

    Launched six months ago as a beta version, the ability of the software to transform Windows Mobile 6 and S60 3G/Wi-Fi handsets into walking “hotspots” has proved very popular.

    The application is capable of tethering up to five devices through a Wi-Fi enabled smartphone.

    Users can retrieve emails and surf the web on devices such as laptops and MP3 players using their handsets’ wireless data plan without the need for the added expense of data cards and dongles.

    While O’Leary was never going to be the most neutral of critics there’s no doubt he is more than pleased with the success of his first hand exposure to the application.

    “Even using it on trains around Europe it worked seamlessly and there was never any problem with connecting,” he told smartphone.biz-news.com at the Smartphone Show in London.

    While 30 per cent of software downloads have been in the US, Europe hasn’t been slow to catch on to the advantages of WalkingHotSpot.

    O’Leary said it was possible to make calls while devices were connected without any degradation in quality for either the devices or the phone call.

    The software is available to download for either a one-time fee of USD $24.99 (€18) for the lifetime of the phone or as a monthly plan for USD $6.99 (€5).

    O’Leary said support for other major operating systems is coming soon.

    To owners of iPhones just being able to easily hook up one device to their handsets would be ample.

  • First US Cities Get Tru2way Digital Cable Service


    Consumers in Chicago and Denver will be the first in the US to experience Comcast’s video-on-demand without a set-top box.

    Panasonic and Comcast today unveiled a tru2way digital cable service for the two cities with additional cities expected to go live in the coming months.

    To coincide with the platform launch, Panasonic’s new tru2way VIERA HDTVs will be available in certain retails stores in Chicago and Denver.

    The Panasonic HDTVs are built with tru2way technology inside, enabling consumers to access two-way digital cable programming, such as video-on-demand, without a cable operator-supplied set-top box.

    Mark Hess, Comcast’s senior vice president of Video Product Development, said tru2way technology was a gateway for customers to experience the next generation of interactive television.

    "This common platform also will let us develop an exciting array of interactive services and applications that we can deliver on our advanced fiber network to a variety of consumer electronics devices," he said.

    Panasonic had announced at the May 2008 Cable Show that the first tru2way HDTVs would be available for consumer purchase at retail by fall 2008.

    Dr Paul Liao, Chief Technology Officer, Panasonic Corporation of North America, said the arrival of the first tru2way HDTVs at retail, combined with Comcast’s activation of its first tru2way head ends, were among the most significant milestones in the cable industry.