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The Telecom Digest for October 19, 2011
Volume 30 : Issue 265 : "text" Format
====== 30 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======
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Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
Internet. All contents here are copyrighted by Bill Horne and
the individual writers/correspondents. Articles may be used in other
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We must fight spam for the same reason we fight crime: not because we
are naive enough to believe that we will ever stamp it out, but because
we do not want the kind of world that results when no one stands
against crime. - Geoffrey Welsh
See the bottom of this issue for subscription and archive details
and the name of our lawyer, and other stuff of interest.
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Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2011 23:28:47 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: To Track or 'Do Not Track'
Message-ID: <p0624088acac2a279e04a@[10.0.1.9]>
To Track or 'Do Not Track': Advancing Transparency and Individual
Control in Online Behavioral Advertising
Omer Tene
College of Management - School of Law, Israel
Jules Polonetsky
Future of Privacy Forum
August 31, 2011
Abstract:
The past decade has seen a proliferation of online data collection,
processing, analysis and storage capacities leading businesses to
employ increasingly sophisticated technologies to track and profile
individual users. The use of online behavioral tracking for
advertising purposes has drawn criticism from journalists, privacy
advocates and regulators. Indeed, the behavioral tracking industry is
currently the focus of the online privacy debate. At the center of
the discussion is the Federal Trade Commission's Do Not Track (DNT)
proposal. The debate raging around DNT and the specific details of
its implementation disguises a more fundamental disagreement among
stakeholders about deeper societal values and norms. Unless
policymakers address this underlying normative question - is online
behavioral tracking a social good or an unnecessary evil - they may
not be able to find a solution for implementing user choice in the
context of online privacy. Practical progress advancing user privacy
will be best served if policymakers and industry focus their debate
on the desirable balance between efficiency and individual rights and
if businesses implement tracking mechanisms fairly and responsibly.
Policymakers must engage with these underlying normative questions;
they cannot continue to sidestep these issues in the hope that "users
will decide" for themselves.
...
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1920505
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2011 22:44:58 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Are Smartphones Becoming Smart Alecks?
Message-ID: <p06240883cac2980e6f36@[10.0.1.9]>
Are Smartphones Becoming Smart Alecks?
New Devices Dish Out Sarcasm, Tell Jokes; 'Two iPhones Walk Into a Bar'
By GEOFFREY A. FOWLER
OCTOBER 15, 2011
Now even your phone talks back.
Matt Legend Gemmell, a software designer from Edinburgh, got a new
Apple Inc. iPhone on Friday and asked it: "Who's your daddy?"
"You are," the phone answered, in the voice of an authoritative man.
Earlier, he commanded: "Beam me up." This time, the iPhone responded:
"Sorry, Captain, your tricorder is in Airplane Mode."
The real science of artificial intelligence is finally catching up to
science fiction. HAL 9000, the creepy sentient computer from the
movie "2001: A Space Odyssey," has been incarnated, in the form of
Siri, a virtual personal assistant that comes with Apple's new iPhone
4S, which arrived in stores Friday.
The phone takes verbal commands and questions, and responds with
computer-generated speech.
Real humans are responding to this alarming breakthrough by asking
their iPhones ridiculous questions.
The good news is, Siri has a sense of humor.
...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204774604576631271813770508.html
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2011 23:32:05 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Top U.S. Websites Share Visitor Personal Data
Message-ID: <p0624088bcac2a3400ec8@[10.0.1.9]>
Privacy Study: Top U.S. Websites Share Visitor Personal Data
By Julia Angwin
October 11, 2011
NOTE: This post has been updated to include clarifications that were
made to the original study.
A study released Tuesday shows that 45% of the top 185 U.S. websites
transmit identifying details about their visitors to at least four
outside websites.
The data transmitted was primarily a "username" - which is the name a
person uses to log into a website - or a user ID assigned by the
website to a user. It was usually transmitted through referrers -
which is information about the web page transmitted automatically.
In some cases, the data went much further: the study found for
instance that the online dating website OKCupid sent the gender, age,
[and] zip code to two companies that sell personal data in auctions,
BlueKai and Lotame. Lotame also received data about 'relationship
status' and 'drug use frequency.'
Lotame confirmed that it has a data licensing relationship with
OKCupid, but said it does not use data in the "drug use category."
BlueKai told Digits that it does not buy or sell data attributes like
"drug use frequency" from OKCupid. "We do capture standard
demographic attributes like zip, age and gender from several
publishers," a BlueKai spokesperson said.
It's not clear how many companies that received the data used the
identifying information. But researcher Jonathan Mayer, a PhD student
at Stanford University's computer security lab, said that the study
proved that online tracking is not anonymous.
...
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2011/10/11/privacy-study-top-u-s-websites-share-visitor-personal-data/
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2011 23:34:08 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Apple Helps Devices Get Their Heads in the Cloud
Message-ID: <p0624088ccac2a3e13489@[10.0.1.9]>
Apple Helps Devices Get Their Heads in the Cloud
by Katherine Boehret
October 11, 2011
Apple devices can be addictive: People buy one tiny iPod, fall in
love, and end up with three or four other Apple products. Now if only
they could see all their data on all those devices simultaneously.
Starting today, they can.
ICloud is designed to store and replicate documents, music, apps and
1,000 photos on PCs, the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. It also syncs
contacts, calendars and email so all your machines and devices have
the same data and content. It will back up five gigabytes of data,
but certain types aren't counted against that total. The best part:
It's free.
I've been testing iCloud's sync ability between a MacBook Pro, iPhone
4S and iPad 3G. I also accessed and added content using iCloud.com.
At first, I ran into a few hiccups with syncing photos, but an Apple
spokesman explained that the company's servers were occasionally down
while they were being prepared for Wednesday's iCloud launch. After
that, iCloud worked without a hitch-well enough that I stopped
thinking about which device held what since they were all updated
with the same content.
...
http://allthingsd.com/20111011/apple-helps-devices-get-their-heads-in-the-cloud/
***** Moderator's Note *****
"And so, Mister Horne", the Senior Investigator said, "according to
records supplied to us by the right-thinking Americans at Apple Corp.,
you have the address and phone number of a known Liberal in your
computer"!
"Jim, come here", cried the statistical lead excitedly, "this index of
correlation is fantastic! I can tell you who he had lunch with two
months ago"!
"Even paranoids have enemies" - Berke
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2011 22:27:30 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: In-depth Review: Apple's iOS 5 mobile operating system
Message-ID: <p06240881cac294498ce8@[10.0.1.9]>
In-depth Review: Apple's iOS 5 mobile operating system
By Daniel Eran Dilger
October 12, 2011
Apple's latest reference release of its mobile platform, iOS 5, isn't
going to leave users wondering if they should upgrade. It's free, it
has no real downsides, and has no competition among iPhone, iPod
touch and IPad users. But here's a look at what's new and why it
matters.
...
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/11/10/12/in_depth_review_ios_5.html
Date: Tue, 18 Oct 2011 02:29:45 -0700
From: Thad Floryan <thad@thadlabs.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Future phones may rewire and reinvent themselves
Message-ID: <4E9D4709.9030003@thadlabs.com>
Slashdot had several interesting items in its email digest for
Monday, 17-OCT-2011. The first one that intrigued me was the
claim future computers won't be "artificial intelligence" as
much as they'll be "artificial consciousness"; article here:
http://h30565.www3.hp.com/t5/Feature-Articles/Science-Fiction-s-Take-on-the-Future-of-Computers-Visionaries/ba-p/556
What really piqued my curiosity, however, was another aspect of
nanotechnology where circuits can be reconfigured on the fly per
the following article:
http://www.telecoms.com/34884/future-phones-may-rewire-and-reinvent-themselves/
First 4 paragraphs are below; article continues at above URL:
Future mobile devices may be able to reconfigure themselves to meet
new demands, according to researchers that have developed a
nanomaterial that can "steer" electrical currents. The discovery could
lead to the development of smartphones and devices that can
reconfigure their internal 'wiring' and evolve into an entirely
different and new device, to reflect the changing needs of consumers.
With smartphones getting smaller and smaller, the materials from which
the circuits are constructed begin to lose their properties and are
more likely to be controlled by quantum mechanical phenomena,
according to the research team from Northwestern University in
Michigan. As devices reach this physical barrier, scientists have
begun building circuits in three dimensions, by stacking components on
top of one another. This technique was pioneered by Intel earlier this
year.
However, the team said that it has taken a fundamentally different
approach be making reconfigurable electronic materials that can
rearrange themselves to meet different computational needs at
different times.
The team is aiming to create a single device able to reconfigure
itself into a resistor, a rectifier, a diode and a transistor based on
signals from a computer. The multi-dimensional circuitry could be
reconfigured into new electronic circuits using a varied input
sequence of electrical pulses, the team said.
***** Moderator's Note *****
George Jetson might get to see this, but it sounds a bit far-fetched
to be useful today.
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Tue, 18 Oct 2011 13:47:50 -0500
From: bonomi@host122.r-bonomi.com (Robert Bonomi)
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Future phones may rewire and reinvent themselves
Message-ID: <o6GdnVr3eLtLVADTnZ2dnUVZ_qednZ2d@posted.nuvoxcommunications>
In article <4E9D4709.9030003@thadlabs.com>,
Thad Floryan <thad@thadlabs.com> wrote:
>the following article:
>
>
> http://www.telecoms.com/34884/future-phones-may-rewire-and-reinvent-themselves/
>
>
>First 4 paragraphs are below; article continues at above URL:
>
[[ sneck ]]
>according to the research team from Northwestern University in
>Michigan.
Northwestern University in MICHIGAN????
Huh?
>From further reading, it's the real Northwestern U., in Evanston IL
I hope telecoms.com does a better job of getting their facts right,
in general.
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2011 23:36:58 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: The iPhone Finds Its Voice
Message-ID: <p0624088dcac2a49c605c@[10.0.1.9]>
The iPhone Finds Its Voice
by Walt Mossberg
October 11, 2011
Sometimes, as we all know, looks can be deceiving. While Apple's
latest iPhone doesn't look different, and may not be the kind of
blockbuster people expect from the late Steve Jobs's company, it
thinks different, to quote one of Apple's old ad slogans. Inside its
familiar-looking body there lurks a nascent artificial-intelligence
system that has to be tried to be believed.
Apple's fifth-generation iPhone, the $199 iPhone 4S, goes on sale
Friday with a new operating system and a new cloud-synchronization
service called iCloud. But, while its insides have been significantly
improved, the phone's exterior design is identical to that of last
year's iPhone 4, which Apple says is the best-selling smartphone in
the world.
I've been testing the 4S for about a week to see how it differs from
the previous model. I also evaluated the key features added by the
new operating system, called iOS 5, including a new, free
text-messaging service; deep integration with Twitter; and the
ability to edit photos right on the phone. This new software will be
available as a free upgrade for owners of the iPhone 4 and the
2009-vintage iPhone 3GS, as well as for Apple's iPad tablet and its
iPod Touch.
...
http://allthingsd.com/20111011/the-iphone-finds-its-voice/
***** Moderator's Note *****
I think the most trenchant remark in the article is this one:
Despite Siri, the iPhone 4S isn't a dramatic game-changer like some
previous iPhones. Some new features are catch-ups to competitors. I
sense Apple chose to focus more on software and cloud service than
on hardware.
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2011 23:28:47 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Tracking the Trackers: Where Everybody Knows Your Username
Message-ID: <p06240889cac2a1bab36f@[10.0.1.9]>
Tracking the Trackers: Where Everybody Knows Your Username
by Jonathan Mayer
October 11, 2011
The Center for Internet and Society (CIS)
Stanford Law School
Click the local Home Depot ad and your email address gets handed to a
dozen companies monitoring you. Your web browsing, past, present, and
future, is now associated with your identity. Swap photos with
friends on Photobucket and clue a couple dozen more into your
username. Keep tabs on your favorite teams with Bleacher Report and
you pass your full name to a dozen again. This isn't a 1984-esque
scaremongering hypothetical. This is what's happening today.
[Update 10/11: Since several readers have asked - this study was
funded exclusively by Stanford University and research grants to the
Stanford Security Lab. It was not supported by any advocacy
organization.]
...
http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/node/6740
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 2011 22:38:33 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Cellphone Users to Get Billing Alerts Under New Voluntary Standards
Message-ID: <p06240882cac296f22ca8@[10.0.1.9]>
Cellphone Users to Get Billing Alerts Under New Voluntary Standards
By AMY SCHATZ
OCTOBER 17, 2011
WASHINGTON-Wireless-phone customers will begin receiving real-time
alerts next year if they are about to go over their monthly voice,
data or text-message limits under new voluntary industry standards
set to be announced on Monday.
Wireless-phone customers will begin receiving real-time alerts next
year if they are about to go over their monthly voice, data or
text-message limits under new voluntary industry standards. Amy
Schatz has details on Lunch Break.
Wireless carriers have agreed to send warnings to consumers in danger
of exceeding their monthly subscriber minutes or data plans under a
deal with the Federal Communications Commission. The companies will
provide the alerts to consumers within 12 to 18 months, FCC officials
said.
...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203658804576635053172551850.html
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