Gadgetell | Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things

Walmart’s Black Friday deals on BlackBerry smartphones have been leaked.  The big box retailer plans to offer the AT&T Curve 8310 for free and the Bold 9000 for $78.88. Sprint’s Curve 8330 will also be offered for free while T-Mobile’s Curve 8520 and its Pearl 8120 Black Emerald have a price tag of $28.88.

Walmart’s Verizon offerings include the Blackberry Storm for $48.88 and the Blackberry Tour for $148.88.  The latter isn’t much of a savings considering Verizon offers it for $149.99 with a BOGO promo.

While some of these deals offer substantial savings, be sure to read the fine print.  A two year agreement is required on all phones and Walmart may charge an activation fee.  Also be aware that in some cases, if you need repair service you may need to go through Walmart rather than your carrier.

Other retailers like Amazon have already matched some of these deals, but Walmart plans to start offering them beginning next Saturday.

Read [PhonesReview]

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

A still struggling economy and skyrocketing unemployment rates mean this holiday shopping season will be all about finding bargains and reducing spending.  A new study out by Deloitte has found that more consumers then ever plan to use the web and their cellphones to find those bargains.  They surveyed over 10,000 consumers about their holiday shopping plans.

The study found that 45% plan to use their cell phones to research prices and 32% will use them to search for discounts.  25% will even go so far as to actually buy gifts on their phones.

The net will continue to play an increasing roll in holiday shopping.  22% said they will do most of their shopping online with 44% saying they will use online coupons to save money.  39% say they will use online reviews to make purchase decisions and 65% say they are likely to buy a product online after seeing it in a store or catalog.

Social networking will be a big factor as well.  The study found a whopping 54% of consumers plan to use social networking to research gift ideas, 52% will use online wish lists and 60% plan to use social networking sites to find discounts.

What are your plans for your holiday shopping?  Will you be cutting back?  Buying online?  Please leave a comment and share with us!

Read [CNet]

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

Malware is absolutely everywhere these days.  Even if you do all the right things like not clicking on links or opening attachments in emails, avoiding bittorents, porn sites and illegal download sites like Limewire (which is full of malware!), not clicking on pop up or banner ads, and being careful about what apps and notifications you open on sites like Facebook, malware can still sneak in.  This is especially true if you are on a network.  Last night while I was online I was suddenly redirected to a rogue anti-virus site.  I was shocked as I am super careful.  I disconnected my wireless card and started running scans-they found 5 Trojans and a rootkit on my system!  Further digging revealed that my husband’s computer had the same infections plus a few more.  I did some more research and asked a few questions and it seems the Trojans are the kind that search out networks and infect every computer on the ones it finds.  In other words my husband’s computer was contagious!  This doesn’t mean he was careless.  Malware is getting so sophisticated these days that many kinds don’t require the user to click on, run or open them. They do it all themselves! This means if you accidentally make a typo and wind up on an unfamiliar site, or accidentally click on a pop up when you try to close it, that site could quietly download malware onto your computer.  Many businesses buy up the misspelled versions of their domain names because they know if they don’t, scammers and cybersquatters will.

How do you protect yourself?  First of all make sure whatever OS you use (and yes there is Mac malware out there!) is kept up to date and all security patches are installed.  Microsoft’s Malicious Software Removal Tool is quite good and should be downloaded and run once a month.  Keep your anti-virus software updated at all times as well.  If you’re on a network, keep your firewall up and running at all times (My husband had accidentally turned ours off, which I believe led to the infections) and make sure your router is protected.  WPA-PSK security is recommended as most hackers can easily crack the old WEP protocol.  Choose a passkey that is a mix of letters and numbers and change it regularly.

There are several good anti-malware programs out there and you should be using at least one. I highly recommend the following:

Malwarebytes:

This is simple, fast and powerful software that detects all kinds of malware, spyware and adware.  It scans files, registry keys, boot sectors, and memory for infections.  The free version is adequate but if you want real-time protection and the ability to schedule regular scans, you can upgrade to the premium version for $24.95.

Spybot Search & Destroy:

This is another great tool for finding malware, spyware and adware on your computer.  It allows you to back up your registry, run scans and has a useful immunization feature that tweaks your browser to block drive by malware, tracking cookies, malicious websites and other bad stuff.  The TeaTimer feature quietly monitors system processes and terminates malicious or suspicious ones and alerts you.  It also alerts when a program tries to change a critical registry key.

AVG:

This is a top notch anti-virus program.  Unlike Norton and McAfee, it’s not bloatware and won’t hog system resources.  There’s a free version and a premium “security suite” for $54.99.  I find the free version to be more than adequate. The one caution I have is that it sometimes flags legit programs as viruses, This kind of false positive crippled iTunes for a short time over the summer. It was quickly fixed however.

Watch where you surf, what you click on and what you download/install, keep your network secure and your anti-virus software up to date and running at all times, and do regular scans with one of the anti-malware programs discussed above and you will spoil the fun for millions of hackers and scammers!

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

Nokia has announced a recall of up to 14 million phone chargers after a routine inspection revealed a design flaw.  The plastic casing surrounding the charger could separate, posing an electrical shock hazard.  The recall involves three separate chargers with model numbers AC-3E, AC-3U and AC-4U.  Model numbers AC-3E and AC-3U were manufactured between June 15 and August 9th of this year and model number AC-4U was manufactured between April 13th and October 25th of this year.

To check your charger, look at the label where the voltage is printed.  If you have one of the affected chargers, record the manufacturer’s name and the long string of numbers at the bottom of the label and visit Nokia’s recall site here.  Enter the information and you will be walked through the steps to exchange it.  Affected consumers can also call 1-888-Nokia2U.

This is the second time in recent years Nokia has discovered quality issues with its phones.  In 2007 the company issued an advisory about faulty batteries made by one of its suppliers.  The batteries had the potential to overheat and the company offered to replace up to 46 million although they never issued a formal recall.

So far no injuries or incidents have been reported as a result of the faulty chargers.

Read [PCWorld]

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

Beatles fans everywhere rejoice!  The band’s catalog is finally being released in mp3 form, but don’t go running to iTunes.  Record company EMI is releasing the entire catalog of 14 albums on a special edition 16GB USB drive.  The drive, which is shiny green and shaped like an apple, will set fans back a whopping $330 and only 30,000 were initially offered for sale.  Pre-orders are already being taken, and it will be officially released on December 8th.  Along with the remastered tracks are rare photos, liner notes and 13 mini documentaries.  It promises to be a real Christmas treat for any Beatles fans with the spare cash to spend or who have a generous friend or relative willing to play Santa.

Does this mean we’re closer to seeing the band on iTunes?  EMI isn’t saying.  So far it has refused to let any retailer sell the band’s music digitally.  Of course that hasn’t stopped BlueBeat.com from selling the entire catalog.  The site offered individual Beatles tracks for .25 cents each and full albums for around $3.25.  When confronted by EMI the site insisted they weren’t doing anything wrong because their offerings are recreations using a process called “psychoacoustic simulation”.  Um yeah.  The site ignored EMI’s cease and desist action and refused to stop selling the tracks until they were slapped with a lawsuit and restraining order.  Whether they thought they could get away with such blatant theft by shrouding it in technical mumbo jumbo or actually believe their copyright infringement is perfectly okay remains to be seen.

If you want one of the Beatles USBs act fast.  EMI says demand has been so overwhelming that they are trying to acquire an additional supply above and over the 30,000 they initially planned to sell. 

Read [PCWorld]

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

As if the new Droid phone from Motorola wasn’t enough, Verizon Wireless has announced the launch of the LG Chocolate Touch.  The Chocolate Touch has a 3 inch touch screen, a 3.2MP camera, full HTML browser, 1GB of memory with additional memory up to 16GB easily added via the SD slot, a music player that plays back MP3, WMA and ACC files, a built in FM radio, Bluetooth, EVDO Rev. 0 connectivity and easy access to social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter.

Verizon is offering the Chocolate Touch for just $80 with a 2 year contract and after a $50 mail in rebate.  Be warned however that the rebate will come in the form of a prepaid debit card, not a check.  The Chocolate Touch looks to be a big seller this holiday season and is just the first in a line of hot new phones being introduced by the big 4 cell providers.  T-Mobile will be offering the My Touch 3G Fender Limited Edition and Samsung Behold II while Sprint will offer the HTC Hero and Samsung Moment and AT&T will have the Pantech Reveal.

Sprint and AT&T are also said to be working on a nationwide launch of new netbooks. Sprint will offer the Dell Mini 10 while AT&T will offer the Nokia Booklet 3G, which will be a Best Buy exclusive over the holidays.  The netbook boasts a 10 inch display, 12hr battery life and Windows 7.  It will be offered for $299 with a data plan or a whopping $599 without.

Read [PR Newswire]

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

Norway’s Consumer Council is threatening to sue Amazon over the user agreement for its popular Kindle e-reader.  The council insists that the terms of the agreement are in violation of basic consumer rights.  Those terms include Amazon’s right to remove books from the Kindle if the terms are violated, their right to change the terms at anytime, and the fact that Kindle books can not be read on any other device.

That last issue is something the council has taken issue with in the past with other companies.  They threatened legal action against Apple in 2006 because at the time items bought from the iTunes store were only playable on iPods.  The complaints were dropped after Apple removed the DRM restriction and allowed songs bought there to be compatible with all mp3 players.

Amazon hasn’t had any comment yet but this bears keeping an eye on.  Many Kindle users share the council’s complaints about books bought on Amazon not being compatible with other ebook readers.  Amazon has slowly been opening up their platform though, first with a Kindle app for the iPhone and iPod Touch and soon will release one for PCs.  With Sony, Barnes & Noble and other companies now offering their own e-readers for sale, Amazon will have it’s work cut out for it if it want to stay on top of the pile.

Read [BetaTales]

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

When the CEO of Packet Focus decided to test the security of the top three smartphones, he was shocked to discover they all failed miserably.  Joshua Perrymon sent a spoofed phishing email made to look like it was a LinkedIn invitation from Bill Gates to users of the iPhone, the BlackBerry and the Palm Pre and found his message got through 100% of the time.  Perrymon says smartphones simply have no protection against phishing attacks.

“What I found on the Palm and BlackBerry is [that there is] no protection to any type of phishing attacks. The Palm runs on Linux, so I SSH’ed into it and looked around. The email client is built in JavaScript and made to download emails from a server - POP, IMAP or Exchange. So if the hosted server doesn’t pick up on the email, then the phone gets the attack delivered.”

Perrymon sent the results of his experiment to RIM, Palm and Apple but none of them responded.  He said he hopes that they will eventually address the issue and hopefully issue a fix of some sort. Just last month RIM fixed a flaw in their browser that would have allowed a hacker to send a malicious link via text message.  The flaw prevented the browser from properly warning the user that the URL and the site certificate didn’t match.  This would have allowed the user to easily fall for a phishing attack.

To help combat this, a company called Deepnet Security has introduced a new app called MobileID that will allow banks, retailers and online service providers to offer authentication protection.  This will insure that customers data is protected and phishing attempts are blocked.  It’s available for Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Symbian and the iPhone.  Norton offers a security suite for smartphones that can also provide protection.  Norton Smartphone Security helps keep your phone free of spam and malware and can protect against phishing attempts by allowing to to block texts from unknown senders. It’s available for $29.99.

Read [SCMagazine]

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

The Malwarebytes Corporation, makers of the excellent anti-malware software of the same name, have discovered that a Chinese rival has been stealing from its database of malware samples and flagging a specific keygen code for the Malwarebytes software using the exact same naming scheme.  When Malwarebytes confronted the vendor, IObit, about the theft, the company denied it and claimed it was just a technical glitch and that Malwarebytes was being malicious by spreading rumors.  However MB ran a test on the shady software, called Security 360, by adding definitions for a fake rogue anti-virus program to its data base.  Security 360 almost immediately added the fake definitions to its own database and used an almost identical naming scheme.

“So we dug further. We accumulated more similar evidence for other detections, and we soon became convinced that this was not a mistake, it was not a coincidence, it was not an isolated event, and it persisted presently in their current database. They are using both our database and our database format exactly.” The company reported in a blog post. “During the course of our investigation, we uncovered additional evidence that IObit may have stolen the proprietary databases of other security vendors as well. We are in the process of contacting these vendors.”

Malwarebytes intends to pursue legal action against IObit.  This incident is a good reminder to always stick with well known security apps like MalwareBytes, Spybot Search and Destroy, AVG, AdAware and others.  Never download a security app you’ve never hear of or one you see advertised in a pop up or spam message.

Malwarebytes is one of the best anti-malware apps around. It’s fast, easy to use, powerful and doesn’t hog system resources.  It supports multi-drive scanning which includes networked drives.  There is a free version available but for real-time protection (which prevents malware infections from ever happening) and the ability to schedule regular scans, spring for the paid version, which is just $24.95.  The protection and piece of mind are worth it!

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2

Sprint has announced it will begin offering a mobile broadband equipped Dell Inspiron Mini 10 in select markets across the country.  The netbook is similar to those already offered by Verizon and AT&T and comes with a built in EVDO Rev.A wireless service. It weighs just over 2.5lbs, offers a bright 10 inch screen, 160GB HDD, 1GB of RAM, and in addition to the built in broadband, includes Bluetooth and WiFi 802.11g connectivity.

“Dell Inspiron Mini 10 is a fun way to easily access the speeds of Sprint’s network to catch-up on email, surf the Web and more,” said Kevin Packingham, senior vice president – Product Development, Sprint. “We are excited to add this great Dell product to our industry-leading portfolio of devices available from Sprint that work on America’s most dependable 3G network. It offers an affordable way to stay in touch and stay connected.”

Sprint is offering the netbook for $199 after a $100 mail in rebate and requires you sign up for their $59.99 a month data plan as well, which comes with a 5GB cap.  Since Dell sells the Mini for $299 on their website it may not be the best deal for your buck.  A data card will give you the freedom to use it with any device you want rather than being locked into a single one, and Sprint’s Mi-Fi portable access point allows up to 5 devices to share the connection.

Still, if you’re in the market for a netbook and mobile broadband anyway and don’t mind being locked to once device, it’s worth checking out.  Sprint’s data service is among the best in the business.  For now, Sprint is only offering the Dell Mini in Baltimore, Phoenix, Indianapolis, the Twin Cities and the Bay Area, but it wouldn’t be unrealistic to see it become available nationwide as the holiday season unfolds.

Read [Business Wire]

• LG X120 netbook coming to the US by way of AT&T and Radio Shack
• AT&T introduces the HP iPAQ Glisten
• Verizon announces the Windows Mobile based Samsung Omnia II, available as of December 2