Mobile

Apps aimed at very young children are a "wild west" of dubious advertising according to the author of a new study. Jenny Radesky of the University of Michigan's CS Mott Children's Hospital said the advertising was often manipulative. The researchers ... looked at 135 Android apps played by children, including the 96 most downloaded from the Google Play store in the "5 And Under" category. Their headline finding was that 95 percent contained at least one form of advertising. That's arguably a little misleading as this includes 42 percent of the apps featuring a commercial character such as one ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Samantha G. writes: " Dear Dennis, I use Facebook Messenger to send and receive text messages to my friends using my Android smart phone. One of the neat features Messenger offers is the ability to take a photo of yourself (or ... someone else) using filters. For example, there's a rabbit filter that puts bunny ears and a mouth on the person being photographed. I had fun with this one day and took over a dozen photos of myself using various filters. Unbeknownst to me, all of these goofy photos were automatically posted in the 'My Story' folder, where they were viewable to ... (view more)

Light could be the key to solving one of the big problems of faster mobile Internet. But the technology, which uses spotlights to send out signals, has some limited range of uses. The technology developed by pureLiFi works on a simple principle: ... rather than using radio waves to transmit data (as does WiFi), it uses light waves. A demo of the system uses ceiling spotlights which blast out light in a cone shape. To the human eye it looks like an ordinary constant light supply. In fact it's actually flickering at incredibly high speeds to create a pattern. 5G Signals Hurt By Walls A plug-in ' ... (view more)

Google has apologized for remotely switching on "battery saver mode" on some Android phones. It says it was an internal test that was mistakenly rolled out. Battery Saver is an optional mode first added to the Android system in 2014. It aims to find ... a balance between reducing battery drain and maintaining convenience and functionality. The mode is effectively a collection of settings changes. These include reducing background processes (activity by apps the user isn't actively using), cutting down on screen animations, and stopping apps from automatically updating. It also disables ... (view more)

Samsung Provokes Debate with Claims that Smartphones Are The Most Secure for Cryptocurrencies Last month, leading Samsung author Joel Snyder penned a blog post in which he made the bold assertion that smartphones encompass the best security for ... owning, trading and managing cryptocurrency. He put this down to the Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs) in which smartphones, and particularly those developed by Samsung, operate. A trusted execution environment (TEE) is a secure area of a processor found on smartphones (not PCs), originally developed in 2010 by Open Mobile Terminal Platform ... (view more)

Google has been tracking mobile device users movements even when they have "Location History" switched off. It turns out users need to turn off a less well-known setting to stop tracking altogether. The issue doesn't just affect devices running ... Android. Some iPhones are also affected if they have Google apps such as Maps or Search running. In theory, switching off the Location History setting on your device or in a Google account will prevent the company tracking and storing location information. The immediate effect is visible as the timeline feature in Google Maps will stop updating. ... (view more)

Officials in Europe want all phone companies to use the same technology for charging mobile devices. If the rules go ahead, it could mean Apple has to ditch its custom 'Lightning' port, and Qualcomm's 'Quick Charge' (used by Android devices). The ... European Union is running an "impact assessment study" to decide whether to push the policy and if so, whether to seek a voluntary agreement or impose rules. If it opts for the latter, manufacturers might decide it is easier to use the relevant charging port format worldwide rather than make specific handsets for Europe. (Source: independent.co.uk ) ... (view more)

The next edition of the Google Android operating system for phones and tablets will include measures to help users spend less time on their mobile devices. The update also makes notifications more useful and addresses battery life problems. The ... changes come in a new version of the operating system that's officially called Android 9.0 but nicknamed Android Pie (or "Android P"), continuing a pattern of naming updates after food. It's already available for Google's own Pixel phones and will then start gradually rolling out to other models, though older handsets may not get the update. ... (view more)

Samsung phone owners say they were shocked to discover photos from their phone were being sent to random contacts. An update to SMS text messaging appears to have caused the bug. One user says the entire contents of his photo gallery was sent to his ... girlfriend's phone via text message. His own phone had no record of the messages being sent and the first he heard of it was when his girlfriend asked him what was happening. Other users report similar issues, with no obvious pattern as to who received the images other than being in their contacts list. Reports suggest the problem is with the ... (view more)

Samsung looks set to release a phone with a giant foldable screen. But rumors of the price are varying wildly. Reports suggest that the phone will fold out a little like a book. When open, the screen will be more than seven inches across, meaning it ... resembles a small tablet computer. When folded, the device will be the size of an ordinary smartphone and, although a little thicker than most phones, should fit easily in a pocket. The idea is that the design would dramatically change what's viable with a phone. For example, working on document editing would be much more bearable for the user. It ... (view more)