Game of Thrones tops TV piracy chart

24 December 2012 Last updated at 07:56 ET

Game of Thrones has emerged as the most-pirated TV show over the internet this year, according to news site Torrentfreak's latest annual survey.

It said one episode of the series had racked up 4,280,000 illegal global downloads - slightly more than than its estimated US television audience.

The site said that overall there had been a "small increase" in the amount of illegal sharing.

That was despite a "levelling out" of the activity the previous two years.

The rise also followed increased efforts to shut down or block websites providing access to copyright infringing material.

Investigations by the US, Mexican and Ukrainian authorities led to two of the best known file-sharing services disappearing earlier this year - digital locker service Megaupload and Bit Torrent link site Demonoid.

The administrators of Newzbin2 - a site which aggregated links to illegally copied material sourced from Usenet forums - also abandoned the operation after the UK courts forced internet service providers (ISPs) to block access.

In addition, UK-based Surfthechannel went offline after its owner went on trial for "facilitating" copyright infringement - a crime which resulted in him receiving a four year prison sentence.

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1. Game of Thrones

2. Dexter

3. The Big Bang Theory

4. How I Met Your Mother

5. Breaking Bad

6. The Walking Dead

7. Homeland

8. House

9. Fringe

10. Revolution

(Source: Torrentfreak)

Several countries ISPs have also been ordered to block The Pirate Bay, although political activists at Europe's Pirate Parties continue to offer proxy-based workarounds.

Delayed broadcasts

Despite all the closures, one episode of of Game of Thrones racked up 4,280,000 illegal global downloads, according to Torrentfreak. That was slightly more than than its estimated US television audience.

The level of piracy may be linked to the fact that the TV company behind it - HBO - does not allow Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime or other US streaming services access to its programmes. It instead restricts them to its own HBO Go online product, which is only available to its cable subscribers.

Outside the US, Torrentfreak noted that Australia was responsible for a disproportionate amount of illegal copies of Game of Thrones and suggested this may have been because episodes were broadcast locally a week later than in the US.

Torrentfreak's editor acknowledged that, despite his findings, HBO might still want to keep its current model.

"Not all of the people who pirate do it because it's free - availability is also a big factor," Ernesto Van Der Sar told the BBC.

"Most of the titles in the top 10 list are behind paywalls and are not distributed very widely. If TV companies offered them online to a broader audience, piracy would be lower than it is now.

"But I'm not sure that would be best for their revenues as they rely on expensive subscriptions which they still sell a lot of. If they allowed people to download individual episodes from Netflix, for example, they might not make as much money."

Ditched laws

The latest effort to combat piracy is a newly announced action plan by Russia and the US.

It involves the two countries:

• Co-ordinating efforts with rights holders and law enforcement agencies to force copyright infringing content off the net and take action against those responsible for putting it online.
• Pledging to seize and destroy equipment used to make the pirated files.
• Working together on legislation, including plans for a Russian law to make ISPs liable for piracy carried over their networks.

"Intellectual property rights not only protect our creators and innovators, but also promote foreign investment, economic development, and job creation." said US Trade Representative Ron Kirk.

It follows success at introducing other anti-piracy action over the past year.

A series of website blackouts and protests led to the US's House of Representatives abandoning its Stop Online Piracy Act (Sopa) and the Senate its Protect Intellectual Property Act (Pipa) in January.

An attempt to bring in an international treaty - the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (Acta) - was also derailed after the European Parliament rejected it in July.

However, more recently countries have signalled they intend to press forward with anti-piracy efforts,

In September, Japan changed the law to introduce a maximum two year jail sentence for users found guilty of downloading pirated files.

Major ISPs in the US have announced plans to launch a "six strikes system" early next year, under which suspected pirates would be sent a series of warning letters before facing bandwidth throttling and other punitive measures. And the UK also plans to introduce a letter-writing scheme in 2013.

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Child abuse Twitter accounts closed

24 December 2012 Last updated at 08:10 ET

Several private Twitter accounts have been disabled after they were revealed to contain indecent images of children.

Some hacking groups are claiming to have unmasked them, the NSPCC said.

Members of the public have reported the accounts to Greater Manchester Police and North Yorkshire Police, while Ceop - the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre - says it is "aware".

The NSPCC asked people to "be vigilant" and report such suspicious activity.

Ceop - the policing unit dedicated to eradicating the sexual abuse of children - said it had had 25 to 30 reports of these accounts.

A Ceop spokesman said Twitter had disabled the accounts and would be reporting the find to the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) - Ceop's US equivalent - which as an American company it was legally required to.

"NCMEC will forward the account details to law enforcement in the countries where the individual concerned is," he said.

It is unclear whether the images were uploaded by a UK user, or a user based abroad.

The NSPCC said the accounts were made public in the early hours of Monday.

"To be honest, it's not a massive surprise. In our experience sex offenders will use whichever mean they can to connect with each other. They are usually quite devious," a spokesman said.

He asked people to be vigilant.

"It you see something, or are aware of something, you should report it."

As for those people storing such content, Professor Alan Woodward, of the University of Surrey's department of computing, said they were increasingly using social media rather than computers.

"If they use the web to keep any pictures then they will be able to claim it wasn't them. The weight of evidence isn't the same."

Twitter is yet to comment.

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Iran 'fends off new cyber attack'

25 December 2012 Last updated at 10:19 ET

A power plant and other industries in southern Iran have been targeted by the Stuxnet computer worm, an Iranian civil defence official says.

But the cyber attack has been successfully rebuffed and prevented from spreading, Iranian media report.

Iran's nuclear enrichment efforts were hit hard in 2010 by the Stuxnet worm, which was also blamed for problems at industrial plants and factories.

Tehran accused Israel and the US of planting the malware.

Provincial civil defence chief Ali Akbar Akhavan said Iranian industry was constantly being targeted by "enemy cyber attacks" and companies in Hormozgan province had recently been infiltrated, the semi-official Isna news agency reported.

"The Bandar Abbas electricity supply company has come under cyber attack," he told a news conference. "But we were able to prevent its expansion owing to our timely measures and the co-operation of skilled hackers."

The Bandar Abbas plant, on Iran's southern coast in the Strait of Hormuz, is said to supply power to neighbouring provinces as well as Hormozgan.

Spyware

Iran has regularly claimed success in defeating computer viruses, such as Stuxnet and Flame, which have affected its industries.

In April, a malware attack on Iran's oil ministry and national oil company forced the government to disconnect key oil facilities, including the Kharg Island oil terminal that handles most of Tehran's exports.

Late last year, Iran said some of its computer systems were infected by the Duqu spyware which was believed to have been designed to steal data to help launch further cyber attacks.

The attacks have affected its energy exports as well as its controversial uranium enrichment programme, which Western countries suspect is aimed at constructing nuclear weapons. Tehran insists it is solely for peaceful purposes.

Continue reading the main story

• Stuxnet worm hits Iranian centrifuges - from mid-2009 to late 2010
• Iran complains facilities hit by Stars malware - April 2011
• Duqu trojan hits Iran's computer systems - November 2011
• Flame virus targets computers in PCs across the Middle East, including Iran and Israel - June 2012
• Iran says Stuxnet worm returns - December 2012

The biggest cyber attack so far was from the Stuxnet worm, believed to be the first known virus specifically targeted at infrastructure such as power stations.

In 2010, Iran accused the West of trying to disrupt its nuclear facilities with the Stuxnet worm.

Researchers estimated that five industrial processing organisations in Iran were hit repeatedly between June 2009 and April 2010 by the worm which they believed had been created by a "nation state" in the West.

Iran said centrifuges used in uranium enrichment had been sabotaged and the UN nuclear watchdog said the enrichment programme had been temporarily brought to a halt.

Reports suggested that the worm had infected the personal computers of staff at Iran's first nuclear power station at Bushehr.

In September this year, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the United Nations General Assembly that time was running out to stop Tehran having enough enriched uranium to build a nuclear bomb.

US President Barack Obama has said the US will do "what we must" to stop Iran acquiring nuclear weapons.

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China opens longest bullet route

25 December 2012 Last updated at 20:24 ET

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The BBC's Matthew Stadlen looks ahead to the high speed line's launch

China has officially opened the world's longest high-speed rail route, linking the capital Beijing with the southern commercial hub of Guangzhou.

The first bullet train left Beijing on Wednesday morning. Trains will initially travel at 300km/h (187mph), more than halving travel time.

A Chinese official has described the route - parts of which were already in operation - as "one of the most technically advanced in the world".

The 2,298km route will have 35 stops.

They include such major cities as Wuhan and Changsha.

The previously 22-hour journey will now take less than 10 hours.

The decision was taken to start the passenger service on 26 December to commemorate the birth of former Chinese leader Mao Zedong, state media said.

China is currently expanding its high-speed rail network across the vast country.

But the ambitious project has not been free from controversy.

Forty people died last summer in a crash on a rapid train line in eastern Zhejiang province and the entire high-speed scheme has been dogged with reports of corruption.

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Samsung seeks US ban on Ericsson

26 December 2012 Last updated at 21:59 ET

Samsung Electronics has sought a ban on the import and sales of some Ericsson products in the US which it claims infringe its patents.

In a complaint filed with the US International Trade Commission (ITC), Samsung has accused Ericsson of breaching seven of its patents.

The move counters Ericsson's complaint to the ITC, made in November, seeking a sales ban on some Samsung products.

Ericsson has also claimed that Samsung infringed some of its patents.

The Swedish firm had a licensing deal with Samsung under which the South Korean manufacturer was allowed to use various technologies patented by Ericsson in its products.

However, the two firms have failed to renew the agreement, despite negotiating for almost two years.

Ericsson has claimed that Samsung wants to reduce the fee it pays to license the said patents, while Samsung has argued that the fee demanded by Ericsson is too high.

"We have sought to negotiate with Ericsson in good faith. However, Ericsson has proven unwilling to continue such negotiations by making unreasonable claims, which it is now trying to enforce in court," Samsung said in a statement.

"Under such circumstances, we have no choice but to take the steps necessary to protect our company."

Patent sharing

Ericsson is one of the earliest innovators in the telecommunications field and holds thousands of patents for technologies used in everyday global communication.

Some of these technologies are key to products made by other manufacturers such as Samsung.

Companies which hold patents to such essential technologies enter licensing agreements with other manufacturers allowing them the use of patents under fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory conditions.

Firms pay royalties to the patent holder to use the technology.

Ericsson earned $938m (£585m) last year in revenue from more than 100 licence agreements with companies in the industry.

However, stiff competition has lead to a much more protective stance by many companies over their patents in order to generate revenues.

Earlier this month, European Union competition regulators accused Samsung of abusing its position of holding key patents, while trying to negotiate royalty rates with rival Apple.

Meanwhile, Nokia and Apple have also taken rivals to court over patent infringement.

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Graphene research gets £21.5m fund

27 December 2012 Last updated at 03:22 ET

The Chancellor, George Osborne, has outlined plans to boost development of the "super-material" graphene.

It is one of the lightest, strongest and most conductive materials known, with great commercialisation potential.

Now, £21.5m - £12m from a 2011 funding of £50m and nearly £10m from the science research council EPSRC - will be allocated to specific universities.

In addition, those universities and their industrial partners will commit a total of £14m to the effort.

Mr Osborne said the investment fund would aim to take the technology "from the British laboratory to the British factory floor".

Graphene is sheets of carbon just one atom thick - the very same material making up a pencil's "lead", but with record-breaking mechanical strength and electronic properties.

Manchester University academics Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov won the 2010 physics Nobel Prize in Physics for isolating the material and measuring some of its astounding properties.

Continue reading the main story

Jason Palmer Science and technology reporter, BBC News

---

Graphene has been called a "wonder material" since its discovery in 2005, which led to a comparatively swift Nobel prize for its discoverers in 2010. Gram for gram, it seems to be lighter, stronger and better in every way that nanotechnology experts can measure. It is hundreds of times stronger than steel, and electrons whip through it far faster than through the chips in your computer.

That combination of mechanical and electronic properties make it a "solution looking for a problem". But it is tricky to work with - sheets just an atom thick are difficult to isolate, to manipulate, to reliably connect to other materials. Those are the engineering challenges ahead.

The push is now in getting it out of UK laboratories and into devices, as nations such as South Korea are already doing. That push seems to be one that the UK's government and research base are increasingly invested in.

But since the material's discovery in 2005, scientists have sought to make good use of those attributes - no easy task when working at the atomic scale.

The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) has now identified the most promising graphene-related research projects in British universities to benefit from state funding.

The University of Cambridge has been awarded more than £12m for research into graphene flexible electronics and opto-electronics, which could include things like touch-screens and other display devices.

Imperial College London will receive over £4.5m to investigate aerospace applications of graphene.

The other successful projects are based at Durham University, the University of Manchester, the University of Exeter and Royal Holloway.

The universities will themselves contribute about £2m to the overall effort, and will work with industrial partners including Nokia, BAE Systems, Procter & Gamble, Qinetiq, Rolls-Royce, Dyson, Sharp and Philips Research - which will together bring in a further £12m in investment.

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Mr Osborne told BBC Radio 4's Today programme there had been "enormous competition" for the graphene research to be done elsewhere in the world, rather than the UK.

He said: "We had to act very quickly... to step in and say we're going to provide funding here in Britain for that activity. That's an example of actually actively backing a winner to keep it in the UK."

Mr Osborne said there were several ways in which the UK could become an attractive location for scientific research, including more financial backing from the government, protecting spending on science, and more investment in big capital science projects.

He added that Britain's universities - the "jewels in the crown" of the UK economy - needed to be protected.

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US chipmaker faces huge patent fine

27 December 2012 Last updated at 06:51 ET

US chipmaker Marvell Technology faces having to pay one of the biggest ever patent damage awards.

A jury in Pittsburgh found the firm guilty of infringing two hard disk innovations owned by local university Carnegie Mellon.

It said Marvell should pay $1.17bn (£723m) in compensation - however that sum could be multiplied up to three times by the judge because the jury had also said the act had been "wilful".

Marvell's shares fell more than 10%.

The maximum penalty would be close to the $3.96bn value of the company, based on its market capitalisation.

Marvell told the Wall Street Journal it would try to convince the judge to reverse the judgement, and would appeal if that failed.

The university's law firm issued a statement saying it took "pride" in securing the award following Marvell's failure to license the university's intellectual property.

Faster disks

Marvell makes a range of chips which includes processors which power devices including Blackberry smartphones, Sony Google TV internet video boxes and LED lighting controllers, as well as hard disks.

Among the disk makers, Western Digital has been its biggest customer over recent years.

Carnegie Mellon had accused Marvell of including technologies - invented by one of its professors and a student - designed to increase the accuracy disk drives read data at high speeds.

The university told the court the firm had sold 2.3 billion chips incorporating the disputed inventions between 2003 and 2012.

Marvell had argued both that its chips had not used the university's tech, and that the patents should never have been awarded in the first place - but the jury disagreed.

Record award

The damage award has the potential to be the biggest in US patent history.

There have only been two larger previous awards, according to law data provider Lex Machina.

In 2007 Microsoft was ordered to pay Lucent Technologies $1.52bn in damages over disputed MP3 and MPEG video technologies; and in 2009 Abbot Laboratories was ordered to pay Centocor Ortho Biotech $1.67bn for infringing its antibodies biotech patents - however, both judgements were later overturned.

That leaves the recent $1.05bn jury award to Apple in its case versus Samsung as the largest outstanding figure - the judge in the case has yet to finalise the sum.

However, one expert said it would be some time before the details of the disk drive dispute would be finalised.

"It is generally the case that US juries make large awards, and it is generally the case that they get reduced on appeal," Ilya Kazi from the UK's Chartered Institute of Patent Attorneys told the BBC.

"If history repeats itself Marvell could face a smaller sum - but it's still too soon to be sure how the process will play out."

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EA forced to remove gun shop links

27 December 2012 Last updated at 07:06 ET

Links to browse and buy real weapons featured in popular war-based video game Medal of Honor have been removed from the title's website.

It followed pressure from groups suggesting that video games were responsible for inciting real-world violence.

A representative for publisher EA said: "We felt it was inappropriate and took the links down."

Company logos, and descriptions of the weapons, remain on the game's website.

In the wake of the school shootings in Newtown, video game makers were criticised by influential US lobby group the National Rifle Association.

"There exists in this country, sadly, a callous, corrupt and corrupting shadow industry that sells and stows violence against its own people," said NRA vice president Wayne LaPierre at a press conference last week.

A special panel led by US vice president Joe Biden is currently examining potential ways to curb gun violence in the country.

Among proposals under consideration is a study into any possible links between children's exposure to video games and violence.

'Unfair advantage!'

On the website for Medal of Honor, which has for years been a major seller for EA since the first title's release in 1999, news updates on the latest title discuss "partnerships" with weapons manufacturers.

A partners page displays 14 logos of companies producing combat equipment - but no longer link directly to the firms' individual sites.

In a separate news item on EA's main website, Medal of Honor's executive producer Greg Goodrich writes: "So head over to the Magpul website and gain an unfair advantage!". It refers to a Colorado-based firearms firm.

A promotional video showing the Magpul equipment was also released by the companies.

Real-world weapons are commonplace in video games which, like other entertainment forms, strive for accuracy and authenticity.

Earlier this year, CBS News reported that seven US Navy Seals were reprimanded after allegedly sharing classified material with games designers working on Medal of Honor.

One of the Seals took part in the raid which resulted in the death of Osama Bin Laden.

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Huge rise in social media 'crimes'

27 December 2012 Last updated at 07:54 ET

The number of alleged crimes involving Facebook and Twitter has increased nearly eight-fold in four years, according to police figures.

There were 653 people charged in 2012 out of 4,908 offences reported to 29 forces in England, Scotland and Wales.

Police chiefs said the figures demonstrate a new challenge.

Last week, interim guidelines were issued, aimed at reducing the number of charges in England and Wales, after a string of controversial court cases.

The conviction of Paul Chambers in 2010 for joking on Twitter about blowing up Robin Hood Airport in South Yorkshire was widely condemned and eventually quashed.

The latest statistics were released by the police under the Freedom of Information Act.

Continue reading the main story

The guidance means some people could avoid trial if they are sorry for criminal comments posted while drunk"

End Quote Dominic Casciani Home affairs correspondent

In 2008, when the level of social network activity was much lower, there were 556 reports of alleged crimes with 46 people charged.

By this year that figure had risen to 4,908 allegations and 653 charged.

Chief Constable Andy Trotter of the Association of Chief Police Officers said it was important that police prioritised social networking crimes which caused genuine harm.

He said: "We need to accept that people have the right to communicate, even to communicate in an obnoxious or disagreeable way, and there is no desire on the part of the police to get involved in that judgment.

"But equally, there are many offences involving social media such as harassment or genuine threats of violence which cause real harm.

"It is that higher end of offending which forces need to concentrate on."

Police forces were asked to provide the number of crime reports in which either Facebook or Twitter was a key factor, and nearly two-thirds responded.

Offences included those committed on the websites, such as the posting of abusive messages, but also violent attacks committed for real but provoked by these kinds of online postings.

As well as menacing and threatening messages, there were also numerous sexual offences including grooming, complaints of stalking, allegations of racially aggravated conduct and reports of fraud.

Greater Manchester Police charged the highest number of people, at 115. Lancashire Police say they received reports of six threats of murder.

Mr Trotter said some of the offences would have been committed anyway, regardless of the existence of social media.

"We have to respect free speech and cannot have police forces responding simply because of public outcry.

"In many ways, online communities can be self-regulating and good at weeding out unacceptable behaviour. We need to find a way of distinguishing between that type of behaviour and that which requires police intervention."

He welcomed recent guidance from the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), saying it set a "high threshold" for that intervention and represented a first step towards a better co-ordinated approach.

Director of Public Prosecutions Keir Starmer QC has announced new guidelines on how people who post offensive messages on Facebook and Twitter should be dealt with.

He admitted the CPS made the wrong "judgment call" in the case of Mr Chambers.

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China opens GPS-substitute to public

27 December 2012 Last updated at 09:41 ET

China has opened up its domestic sat-nav network to commercial use across the Asia-Pacific region.

Beidou - named after the Chinese word for the Big Dipper constellation - offers an alternative to the US's global positioning system (GPS).

It had previously been restricted to the Chinese military and government.

A spokesman said that Beidou is targeting a 70-80% share of the Chinese market in related location services by 2020.

The China Satellite Navigation Office added that by that time it also intended the service to be available across the globe.

Growth plan

Chinese officials say that Beidou can identify a user's location to 10m (33ft), their velocity to within 0.2 metres per second, and clock synchronisation signals to within 50 nanoseconds.

At present the receiver chips cost several times more than their GPS equivalents.

However - assuming prices fall - the Chinese government believes manufacturers will want to build them into equipment alongside those made for the US system, to offer users improved coverage.

Six satellites are already in orbit, but officials said they planned to add a further 40 to the system over the next decade, according to a report by China Daily.

Satellite launches

Organisers have estimated that the market for transport, weather, and telecom spin-off services from Beidou's signals could be worth 200bn yuan ($32bn; £20bn) by 2015.

However, it is widely thought another motivation for the project is China's desire not to be reliant on a foreign-operated system that could be turned off at a time of conflict,

The country recently showed off domestically-built drone aircraft at the China International Aviation and Aerospace Exhibition, which would be reliant on such location data to operate.

Beidou is one of a growing number of alternatives to GPS under development.

Russia is developing the Glonass system for both civilian and military use.

It has 23 operational satellites in orbit. However, a recent report by Russia Today suggested the country's defence ministry had reservations about the project after a corruption scandal and technical problems.

The EU is also working on its own network - Galileo. It began sending test signals from its third satellite at the beginning of the month - a minimum of four are necessary to lock onto a location.

Meanwhile, UK defence company BAE Systems is working on Navsop - a system that relies on hundreds of existing signals including those used for radio, TV, wi-fi and mobile phones.

It suggests that when completed the system could offer "superior performance" to more expensive dedicated navigation satellite networks. However, it has not announced a launch date.

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Instagram denies photo selling

18 December 2012 Last updated at 19:20 ET

Facebook's photo-sharing service Instagram has moved to deny that it has changed its privacy policy to give it the right to sell users' photos to advertisers without notification.

It said instead that users had incorrectly interpreted its revised terms of service, which it blamed on its "confusing" choice of language.

Instagram's clarification follows much user opposition to the believed change.

"To be clear: it is not our intention to sell your photos," it said.

Instagram chief executive Kevin Systrom said in a blog posting: "It is our mistake that this language is confusing.

"We are working on updated language in the terms to make sure this is clear."

Compulsory changes to Instagram's terms of service are due to come into effect on 16 January,

The originally proposed new wording that caused the controversy included: "You hereby grant to Instagram a non-exclusive, fully paid and royalty-free, transferable, sub-licensable, worldwide license to use the content that you post on or through the service."

The terms also stated that "a business or other entity may pay us to display your username, likeness, photos, and/or actions you take, in connection with paid or sponsored content or promotions, without any compensation to you."

Following Instagram's denial, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a US pressure group that campaigns for consumer rights on websites and in social media, told the BBC that "there appeared to be a little bit of a word game at play here".

"It clearly looked like Instagram was indeed grabbing the extra rights," added spokesman Parker Higgins.

"It is hard to evaluate the damage this may cause to the company at this early stage, but any social network risks losing the trust of its users. And social networks depend on users being willing to share information, on users seeing them in good terms."

Facebook bought Instagram for $1bn (£616m; 758m euros) in April of this year.

Instagram now has 100 million users.

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Pirate Bay proxy gets shut down

19 December 2012 Last updated at 09:20 ET By Dave Lee Technology reporter, BBC News

A proxy service allowing access to banned piracy website The Pirate Bay has been shut down after legal threats from the music industry.

Minor political group the Pirate Party UK launched the proxy earlier this year ahead of a High Court order blocking The Pirate Bay site.

The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) threatened legal action if the proxy was not removed.

The group has now said such proceedings should no longer be necessary.

The High Court's ruling in April this year meant The Pirate Bay - which was formerly one of the UK's most visited websites - had to be blocked by all the country's major internet service providers.

However, the Pirate Party UK - which is not affiliated with the Pirate Bay - launched a special section of its website which allowed UK users to circumvent the ban and still get onto the site and download movies, music and other pirated material.

'Undermining growth'

After launching the proxy, the Pirate Party website's popularity skyrocketed. According to monitoring service Alexa, prior to the proxy's launch the site was ranked 1,943 in the UK.

It then jumped to 147 - higher than the likes of Netflix, the Huffington Post and the NHS.

Continue reading the main story

No political action is wasted"

End Quote Loz Kaye Pirate Party UK

At the beginning of December, the BPI wrote to Pirate Party UK leader Loz Kaye to request the proxy be shut down.

Mr Kaye refused, prompting the music industry body to instruct its solicitors to contact the party's executive members individually to warn of possible legal action.

"We asked Pirate Party UK to remove the proxy because The Pirate Bay is an illegal site that is undermining the growth of legal digital music services," said BPI chief executive Geoff Taylor in a statement on Wednesday.

"We believe its executives should respect the law, and the basic right of creative people to be paid for their work.

"There are many fantastic digital music services that make it simple to get music legally online. This outcome will help ensure that this new digital sector in the UK can grow, continue to innovate for music fans, and create more UK jobs."

'Fantastic year'

On Friday, the Pirate Party said it would comply with the BPI's request.

"Despite attempts by elected members to resolve this situation, the law at present is clear and makes any decision to continue hosting the proxy untenable," said the party's lawyer, Frances Nash.

"This is not the outcome the party wanted; however, any challenge to this proposed action would make it financially impossible for the party to deal with other issues for which they actively campaign on a daily basis.

"The Pirate Party strongly believe that site blocking is both disproportionate and ineffective and will continue to lobby for digital rights and their wider manifesto."

Speaking to the BBC, Pirate Party UK leader Mr Kaye said taking on the BPI in court would have been "financially impossible", but said he was happy with his party's stance up to this point.

"No political action is wasted," he told the BBC.

"I look forward to carrying on the political work in 2013. This year has been a fantastic year for our brand of politics. It's clear that it's becoming politically poisonous to be anti-internet."

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RFU trials ref-cam this weekend

The Rugby Football Union is trialling a "ref-cam" during the televised Championship game between Newcastle Falcons and London Scottish on Sunday.

Match official Matt Carley will have a camera attached to his shirt to show close-ups of on-the-field action.

Fly-half Joel Hodgson:

"I can't see it distracting the boys' mind process much, we're very focused here.

"It'll be fun and games for the viewers but it won't disrupt us too much.

"You'll have to tell the boys in the front row to watch themselves."

Hooker Rob Vickers:

"It's an interesting one. If I was a viewer would I want to see and hear it? It might be nice to get an insight into what's going on.

"As a player it's our job to make sure it doesn't distract us. We're all aware it's going on.

"With all technology it has to move on and evolve and if that's how they think it's going to be let's give it a go."

"It offers a new perspective for viewers," said head of professional referee development Ed Morrison.

"It will also provide us with an additional tool which can be utilised within the development of referees."

Referees at televised matches are already connected to microphones which keep the dialogue between players and officials open to all.

Likewise, in both union and league codes of rugby, cameras are located in dressing rooms to give viewers an insight behind the scenes, but this is the closest the sport has come to bringing an insight at pitch level.

"I don't know whether I like it. They're bringing all these things in to improve the viewers' experience. It's going to be something different," Newcastle Falcons director of rugby Dean Richards told BBC Newcastle.

"It's something we have to be mindful of. It's a high-pressure game with a few thousand people here.

"When you get so close to the action it's a different experience to at a distance. I'm nervous about it."

The game will be shown live on Sky Sports 3 at 15:00 GMT on Sunday.

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Bankrupt Kodak gets $525m lifeline

19 December 2012 Last updated at 12:11 ET

Eastman Kodak has sold its digital imaging patents to a consortium of bidders, which includes Google and Apple, for $525m (£322m).

Kodak said 12 intellectual property licensees led by Intellectual Ventures (IV) and RPX Corp bought the patents.

The photography pioneer has sold the patents to pay creditors after filing for bankruptcy in January.

The bids for the roughly 1,100 patents up for sale fell short of a $2.6bn target.

Companies participating in the consortium buying the patents include Apple, Microsoft, Google, Samsung, Adobe, Facebook, Amazon, Shutterfly, BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion, Fujifilm, HTC and Huawei Technologies.

IV and RPX are so-called "patent aggregators" which dedicate themselves to buying and then licensing out patent rights.

In the initial stages of the bid process IV and RPX had formed two rival consortiums to purchase Kodak's patents, with Apple backing IV and Google behind RPX, before they decided to collaborate.

'Major milestone'

The agreements are subject to approval by the US Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan.

"This monetisation of patents is another major milestone toward successful emergence," said Kodak's chairman and chief executive officer Antonio Perez.

"This proposed transaction enables Kodak to repay a substantial amount of our initial DIP loan [loans used to turn around a business], satisfy a key condition for our new financing facility, and position our commercial imaging business for further growth and success."

The patent portfolios on sale include ways to let devices capture, process, edit and transmit images.

Kodak filed for Chapter 11 protection in January. Chapter 11 refers to a section of the US Bankruptcy Code. It protects a company from its creditors, giving it time to reorganise its debts or sell parts of the business.

Kodak filed a motion to sell several of its patents in June after pulling out of the digital camera business to focus on making printing equipment. It plans to exit bankruptcy in the first half of 2013.

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Military satellite heads skyward

19 December 2012 Last updated at 17:29 ET By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

A powerful new telecommunications satellite for the UK military has blasted into orbit.

The five-tonne Skynet-5D platform was sent up on an Ariane rocket from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana.

It complements three others already in operation, enabling British forces to stay connected over most of the globe.

The Skynet system, which includes the radio equipment deployed on ships, on vehicles and in the hands of troops, is the UK's single biggest space project.

It is valued at up to £3.6bn over 20 years and is run by a commercial company, Astrium, in a Private Finance Initiative (PFI) with the Ministry of Defence (MoD).

UK forces pay an annual service charge for which they get guaranteed bandwidth, with spare capacity then sold to "friendly forces". These third party customers include the Nato allies such as the US.

The Ariane left the ground at precisely 18:49 local time (21:49 GMT) and dropped off Skynet-5D 27 minutes later over the east coast of Africa. 5D will now use its own propulsion system to move into a geostationary position at an altitude of 36,000km. The eventual operating position early next year will be at 53 degrees East.

The first three spacecraft in the Skynet series were launched in 2007-2008. They all match the sophistication of the very latest civilian platforms used to pass TV, phone and internet traffic, but have been "hardened" for military use.

Classified technologies on board will resist, for example, attempts to disable the spacecraft with lasers or to "jam" their operation with rogue signals.

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Jonathan Amos was given special access to Skynet-5D before its launch

Putting a fourth spacecraft in the fleet gives some assurance to the MoD that a basic service can be maintained through this decade even if there is a failure in orbit of one or two satellites.

5D is largely a clone of 5A, 5B and 5C, and even includes a number of spare parts held in reserve.

"From a distance you would not be able to tell the difference between them all," said Van Odedra, the Skynet programme manager at Astrium, Europe's biggest space company.

"It is inside though that there have been some subtle changes in terms of the configuration - particularly the UHF payload. We were able to introduce some design changes to be able to provide more than double the number of channels compared with 5A, 5B and 5C."

UHF (Ultra High Frequency) is much in demand. The frequency supports "comms on the move" - soldiers in forward deployments with backpack radios, and the like.

The MoD wants more of it and Astrium is keen to be able to sell additional capacity to its third-party customers.

A lot of key encrypted data will go through the satellite's X-band (SHF, Super High Frequency) payload.

Astrium intends to purchase further X-band capacity on a Canadian satellite launching next year. This will be positioned over the Americas and when combined with Skynet's own X-band offering will give UK forces coverage from 178 West to 135 East - near global coverage.

Antarctic support

Although principally a military system, Skynet is finding use also in civilian sectors.

"Using Skynet, we also support something called the High Integrity Telecommunication System (HITS) for the UK Cabinet Office," explained Simon Kershaw, executive director of government communications at Astrium Services.

"HITS is a civil-response, national-disaster-response capability. It was deployed during the Olympics. It provides emergency comms support. The network runs from police strategic command centres across the UK into the crisis management centres, and into government as well," he told BBC News.

"And we still fly three of the old Skynet-4 satellites, one of which is now 22 years old - not bad for a design life of eight years.

"Skynet-4C is now in such an inclined orbit that we offer several hours of coverage over the South Pole each day. It's a niche and unique capability for what is a geostationary satellite." The British and American Antarctic operations make use of this service.

5D represents probably the completion of the current generation Skynet system. Already, Astrium is in discussion with the MoD about the shape of a possible follow-on.

It is not clear just yet what the military's requirements will be in the 2020s but it is almost certain to include some satellite capability.

Whatever happens, those spacecraft still working at the end of the Astrium contract will pass to the ownership of the MoD for the sum of £1.

Ariane's second "passenger" for Wednesday's flight was the three-tonne Mexican telecommunications platform Mexsat Bicentenario. It was released by the rocket's upper-stage 36 minutes after launch.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

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Players drive zombie game offline

20 December 2012 Last updated at 05:47 ET

A zombie-themed video game has been removed from the Steam online store after a series of player complaints.

Gamers complained on Steam chat forums that The War Z lacked features promised in promotional material.

They also complained about changes that let players pay to return to the game quicker after being killed by zombies.

Steam-operator Valve said it had been a "mistake" to put War Z on sale and offered full refunds.

Missing features

In a statement, Valve said The War Z had been issued "prematurely" and would not go back on sale until "we have time to work with the developer and have confidence in a new build".

Those who downloaded the game and are happy to keep playing can continue to do so, it added.

The War Z was promoted as an open-world massively multi-player game that challenged gamers to survive in a many different zombie-infested virtual environments. In addition, said developer Hammerpoint, up to 100 players would be able to join each server and gamers would be able to draw up friends lists, rent their own private servers and improve game characters via a sophisticated skill tree.

When the game went on sale it quickly became the top seller on the widely used Steam service. However, those who bought the game and installed it found few of the claims made for it were accurate.

Complaints began appearing on chat forums on Steam and on social media site Reddit. Players vented their feelings about an update that changed re-spawn times from one hour to four hours when their character was killed. Players could resurrect instantly if they paid using an in-game currency that can only be bought using real money.

The furore led Valve to halt sales of the game and offer refunds. In addition, Hammerpoint changed the way the game was described on Steam to be more accurate and issued a statement to address "questions and concerns".

Hammerpoint said the version of War Z released on Steam was a "foundation release" that was equivalent to a basic version that would be regularly updated as development work was completed. Private servers, more virtual environments, skills and other promised features would be added in the next few months, it said.

Sergey Titov, executive producer of The War Z, told PC Gamer that he agreed with Valve's decision to remove the game from Steam. He said Hammerpoint "made the mistake of not communicating effectively to the Steam community".

Although no longer available via Steam, The War Z is still available via the Hammerpoint website.

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Apple faces 'pinch-to-zoom' review

20 December 2012 Last updated at 06:29 ET

Apple's "pinch-to-zoom" patent should not have been awarded, according to a preliminary ruling by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

The innovation was at one of six patents at the heart of a recent lawsuit between the iPhone-maker and Samsung.

For now the patent remains valid and Apple is expected to appeal.

However, it could ultimately mean that a judge reduces the amount of damages that Samsung has to pay.

It is the second time in three months that the USPTO has placed one of Apple's patents in the case under review.

In October it was revealed it had taken the same action against Apple's "rubber band" user-interface effect which makes lists appear to bounce and snap back in place after a user has scrolled beyond their end.

Rejected claims

News of the latest decision was made public in a filing submitted by Samsung to a California court on Wednesday.

The patent is formally referred to as "application programming interfaces for scrolling operations".

Although it has been commonly referred to as the basis for Apple's "pinch-to-zoom" control mechanism, it specifically describes ways for software to determine whether it should scroll through material or transform it by zooming in or out, or rotating it.

It suggests this could be worked out by seeing if one finger was used or several and examination of the way they were dragged.

A total of 21 specific methodologies are claimed by Apple's filing. All were rejected by the patent office on the basis that they had already been granted to previous applicants - something the USPTO had not discovered before approving the document in November 2010.

Wired's news site notes that the majority of patents that are re-examined by the USPTO survive in one form or another.

However, Samsung will likely use the news to press a judge to reduce the $1.05bn (£650m) damages a jury said it should pay last August.

Apple is pressing for the sum to be increased, but the judge has yet to confirm a figure.

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Firm pulls 3D gun-parts print plans

20 December 2012 Last updated at 06:56 ET

3D printing firm MakerBot has pulled a collection of blueprints for gun parts from its website in the wake of last week's Sandy Hook mass school shooting.

Users were notified by lawyers that the software models for parts were deleted from design-sharing site Thingiverse.

MakerBot attorney Richard McCarthy said "recent events served as the impetus to take immediate action".

The move came as US President Barack Obama set a January deadline for proposals to deal with gun violence.

There have been calls for gun law reform after 26 children and teachers died at Sandy Hook School in Newtown, Connecticut.

MakerBot cited its terms of service that users agree not to use the website "to collect, upload, transmit, display, or distribute any user content that... promotes illegal activities or contributes to the creation of weapons, illegal materials or is otherwise objectionable".

'Creative focus'

The company said that it had the right to review and take appropriate action against Thingiverse users if they breached its terms of use - the only hitch being that until a day ago, anyone could download files for key gun components, including the latest lower receiver for an AR15 semi-automatic rifle.

Continue reading the main story

Congress passed a law banning plastic guns for two decades, when they were just a movie fantasy"

End Quote Steve Israel US congressman

Mr McCarthy, who represents the company, said in a comment to tech website Cnet: "We reiterate or emphasize the site's focus on creative empowerment for products that have a positive impact."

New York-based MakerBot has a 22% market share of all 3D printers, and is better known for its printable objects of everything ranging from toys, 3D portraits, tools and even Jedi lightsabers. Each Replicator 2 Desktop 3D Printer costs about $2,200 (£1,350).

The fresh debate over gun control in the US could increase scrutiny over the 3D-printed gun market. One US congressman last week urged a renewal of the 1988 Undetectable Firearms Act which bans firearms capable of slipping through airport metal detectors. The law expires in December 2013.

The call by Congressman Steve Israel was made in reaction to a test-firing of a "Wiki Weapon" by members of a group aiming to create the world's first 3D-printed gun.

"Congress passed a law banning plastic guns for two decades, when they were just a movie fantasy," said Mr Israel.

"With the advent of 3D printers these guns are suddenly a real possibility, but the law Congress passed is set to expire next year," he added.

'Internet routes'

Reacting to MakerBot's crackdown, Cody Wilson, founder of Defense Distributed which is behind the "Wiki Weapon" project, reportedly said that he planned to create a new site for "hosting 'fugitive' 3D-printable gun files in the next few hours".

"The internet routes around censorship," he said. "The project becomes more vital."

His company website says: "This project might change the way we think about gun control and consumption. How do governments behave if they must one day operate on the assumption that any and every citizen has near instant access to a firearm through the internet?"

Making 3D printed guns a reality still has a long way to go, the first being as Defense Distributed states: "These guns will be almost completely plastic, so melting and failing in your hand will be a concern."

Victims of last Friday's massacre were being laid to rest as Mr Obama appointed Vice-President Joe Biden to lead a task force to produce concrete proposals on the reform of gun laws within a month.

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Ofcom names 4G auction bidders

20 December 2012 Last updated at 07:17 ET

Seven bidders for the auction of bandwidth for 4G mobile broadband services have been named by Ofcom.

The bidders are Everything Everywhere, BT, Vodafone, O2 and Three, as well as Hong Kong conglomerate PCCW and UK network supplier MLL Telecom.

The telecoms regulator said the auction would increase the amount of airwave available for mobiles by more than 75%.

The auction is due to start next month, with licences granted by March and services launching in May and June.

The complete list of bidders is:

• Everything Everywhere (EE), which has already been permitted to launch the UK's first 4G service using existing bandwidth and did so on 30 October
• PCCW, a major Hong Kong telecoms conglomerate, operating through its subsidiary HKT
• Hutchison Whampoa, another Hong Kong conglomerate and operator of the 3 network
• MLL Telecom, a telecom network supplier founded in 1992 and based in Marlow, Buckinghamshire
• BT, via its subsidiary "Niche Spectrum Ventures"
• Telefonica, the Spanish incumbent telecoms company that owns the O2 network
• Vodafone

"New 4G services will stimulate investment, growth and innovation in the UK, and deliver significant benefits to consumers in terms of better, faster and more reliable mobile broadband connections," said Ed Richards, Ofcom's chief executive.

Continue reading the main story

Frequency	Purpose	Owners
Below 800 MHz	Radio navigation, transport communications, commercial radio	Various
800 MHz	Old analogue television frequency, being auctioned for 4G
900 MHz	Original 2G frequency, now also used for 3G	O2, Vodafone
1.8 GHz	Original 2G frequency, now also used for 3G and 4G (EE only)	O2, Vodafone, EE
2.1 GHz	3G frequency created in 2000	O2, Vodafone, EE, Three
2.3 GHz	Military radio communications, slated to be auctioned for 4G in 2014	Ministry of Defence
2.4 GHz	Household devices, such as wi-fi, bluetooth, cordless phones, microwave ovens	None designated (often resulting in local interference)
2.6 GHz	Being auctioned for 4G
3.5 GHz	Military radar, slated to be auctioned for 4G in 2014	Ministry of Defence
Above 3.5 GHz	Radar, satellite communications	Various

Download speeds will initially be at least five to seven times faster than existing 3G networks, Ofcom claimed.

Ofcom aims to award licences to at least four "credible national wholesalers of mobile services".

The auction is expected to raise £3.5bn for government coffers, or 0.2% of the UK's annual economic output, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility - far less than the £22bn raised by the auction of 3G space, which was held at the height of the dotcom bubble in 2000.

However, many analysts are sceptical that the 4G auction will raise even £3.5bn.

Penetrating buildings

The auction is making use of the 800MHz radio spectrum freed up by the switch from analogue to digital television, and also offers an additional higher-frequency 2.6GHz band.

Ultra-high frequencies - between 300MHz and 3GHz - are seen as a sweet-spot for mobile communications, as they combine acceptable signal range with adequate capacity for high data transmission, such as in the case of video streaming.

Lower frequency radio waves travel further and penetrate buildings more easily, and are seen as better suited to rural areas.

The higher frequency band is better able to cope with heavy data transmission, and is seen as preferable in urban areas, although its more restricted reception area means that operators may need to set up more masts, including inside some public buildings.

EE, which was formed from the merger of Orange and T-Mobile in the UK, is said to be taking part so that it can gain additional frequency bands to expand its recently launched 4G service.

EE has made use of old 2G - non-broadband - 1.8GHz bandwidth, that the merged network inherited from its two predecessors, after being given a special dispensation from Ofcom in August.

However, the network has been criticised for being patchy and unreliable.

One test conducted in Manchester found that just 40% of tested locations got 4G reception from EE. The 4G provider, however, said the test was conducted in Greater Manchester and the service is available in over 80% in the city itself.

Spare capacity?

More 4G capacity will become available in the coming years.

Earlier this week, the Ministry of Defence said that it would also auction off even higher frequency bandwidth - up to 15GHz - that it owns, but not until 2014.

Meanwhile, a ruling by the European Union requires Ofcom to permit operators to switch existing 3G bandwidth they currently control over to 4G from 2014.

The additional bandwidth is useful to operators, as individual 4G services take up a bigger chunk of spectrum than earlier mobile telephony, although 4G is also more versatile in the range of bandwidths that it can operate within.

Mobile services occupy relatively tight bands of the radio spectrum within the 300MHz to 3GHz sweet-spot, meaning that there is plenty of capacity available to support much greater mobile data transmission in future.

However, Ofcom's ability to provide new bandwidths within the UK is limited by the need to harmonise bandwidths internationally.

Mobile handsets are designed to tune into the same specific frequencies in many different countries. Producing a separate handset just for UK-only frequencies would be more expensive for manufacturers.

The new 800MHz frequency for 4G is being made available across the whole of Europe as a result of the switch-off of analogue television broadcasting.

Ironically, the UK was the first country to inaugurate digital television in 2007, but then had to change the frequency of digital TV broadcasting - requiring people to retune their television - in order to bring the UK into line with the rest of Europe.

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Wireless car phone charging in 2013

20 December 2012 Last updated at 07:37 ET

Charging your smartphone while driving could soon be a simple process needing no cables or adaptors, but using a special wireless mat.

Toyota plans to introduce the system for mobile devices in 2013 in its new Avalon sedan, using a charging standard known as Qi (pronounced "chee").

Chrysler wants to offer a similar option in its Dodge Dart model.

One analyst told the BBC the feature was likely to become mainstream in the months to come.

The wireless charging option will be a part of Toyota's $1,950 (£1,200) "technology package", said to be available from next spring.

To charge a device, a driver will simply have to place it on the mat, though the handset has to have a Qi protocol integrated in it.

Currently, Qi wireless charging is supported by 34 mobile phone models, including the LG Google Nexus 4, Nokia Lumia 920 and HTC Windows Phone 8X.

There are also add-on systems for other smartphones.

"Pioneering the ability to charge with no wires or connectors by simply putting devices in the car console is an intuitive innovation which reflects Toyota's continuing commitment to improve the consumer experience," said Randy Stephens, chief engineer of Toyota Avalon, in a statement.

Magnetic induction

Qi works via magnetic induction that involves transmitting energy over a magnetic field.

Continue reading the main story

We're constantly striving to get thinner devices but by adding an infrastructure inside a device can compromise the thinness"

End Quote Shaun Collins CCS Insight

Inductive charging plates have been around for several years, and have been integrated in some mobile phones, such as the Palm Pre.

But in 2008, the Wireless Power Consortium, which has more than 100 members, including Samsung, Nokia, HTC, Motorola Mobility and Sony, signed an agreement for an open standard for wireless power, called Qi.

This means that any Qi-enabled handset is compatible with any Qi charger, regardless of the brand.

General Motors announced in 2011 plans to introduce a pad using magnetic induction in its Chevrolet Volt, but so far it has not happened.

An Israeli firm, Powermat Technologies, is currently placing charging pads for mobile phones in numerous public venues around the US, including Starbucks.

There are companies investigating wireless charging via induction for electric cars, which works by having a charging pad on the floor of your garage.

The technology is finally becoming mainstream, according to Shaun Collins, an analyst at consultancy firm CCS Insight.

"Wireless charging is emerging after some years in the wilderness, and is now being adopted [more and more]," he told the BBC.

"The technology is starting to take on much more prominence with the devices [such as the latest] Nokia Windows 8 phone that has wireless charging in it.

"There's a slight dilemma for mobile devices though, as we're constantly striving to get thinner devices but by adding an infrastructure inside a device can compromise the thinness."

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Phone has second e-paper screen

12 December 2012 Last updated at 08:23 ET

A smartphone with two screens - one of which uses e-ink technology - has been announced by a Russian company.

Yota says having an added low-power screen will help users keep across social network updates and show critical information that stays visible even if the handsets run out of power.

It plans to put the 4G Android device on sale in the second half of 2013.

But one analyst said the innovation was a "gimmick" which might struggle to do well in western markets.

Saint Petersburg-based Yota is best known for making modems and router equipment.

If its plans come to fruition this would be its first mobile phone,

It says it plans to sell its handset at the premium end of the market which is currently occupied by phones such as the Samsung Galaxy S3, HTC One X and Sony Xperia T.

E-ink displays are commonly used for e-book readers and are easier to read in the sun than their LCD equivalents, but offer a slower refresh rate making them unsuitable for videos or most games.

Dual display

Yota says both the colour LCD and black-and-white e-paper displays would be 4.3in (10.9cm) in size, and placed on opposite sides of the device's body.

Both would be protected by impact-resistant "gorilla glass" developed by the US company Corning to reduce the risk of breakage.

Yota's chief executive said he believed other companies had not previously launched similar devices because in the past there had not been a clear need for users to want a second screen.

But, he added, changing habits had created a gap in the market.

"Two years ago we were not so dependent on all the kinds of information we consume now, from Facebook and Twitter to news and other RSS feeds," Vlad Martynov told the BBC.

"The smartphone is now a window onto this virtual life, but today there's a lot of disappointment when you miss information.

"Our electronic paper display with our applications will remove this irritation."

In addition to letting users dedicate different tasks to different screens, Mr Martynov suggested users might want to display important information such as an airline boarding pass or a map on the e-ink screen to take advantage of the fact that the technology only uses power to refresh - and not maintain - its image.

As a consequence the phone keeps showing the last graphic or text sent to its second display even if its battery has died.

Hard sell

Yota says it has been working on the project for two years, but that it still needs to complete work on the five or six apps that will be bundled with the device to make use of its second screen.

Ultimately if the handset proves popular, it says it hopes third-party developers will customise their programs for the innovation.

However, one industry watcher cast doubt over whether that would happen.

"I don't see many users wanting this device in the US or Western Europe," said Francisco Jeronimo, research manager at consultants IDC.

"China may be different - they like more gimmicky phones that can handle several Sim cards and feature unusual types of display - but none of those devices have done well elsewhere.

"Brand is quite a strong purchasing decision factor in western markets as well, so unless this were being promoted by a company like Samsung or being sold at a very low price I can't see much demand."

Yota says it plans to debut its handset at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February.

It says it then aims to manufacture the device in Asia so that it can go on sale in Russia "in the summer", and in Europe and North America before the end of 2013.

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London bus fares go contactless

12 December 2012 Last updated at 12:00 ET

London buses are to start accepting contactless payments from Thursday.

Passengers on the city's 8,500 vehicles will be able to buy tickets by swiping a credit, debit or charge card by an NFC (near field communication) reader.

Transport for London follows Stagecoach which began installing NFC equipment on its buses in 2009.

TfL also operates the Oyster smartcard scheme which uses an earlier RFID (radio-frequency identification) technology.

The buses' Oyster card readers have been upgraded to be compatible with both types,

Smartphones that can mimic contactless cards should also work with the equipment,

However, users are being warned to be careful about swiping their wallet against readers if they own more than one NFC-enabled card.

"If you present two cards together, the reader will normally reject them both," an email to Oyster card users said.

"But there is a small possibility of payment being taken from a card which you did not intend to use."

TfL said it planned to introduce the technology to the London Underground Tube system at a later point.

Uneducated about NFC

The Oyster card touch-and-go system was first introduced in London in 2003 to help speed up passage through Tube gates and bus doors.

Dozens of other towns and cities in the UK have since introduced similar systems.

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New technology means you can 'touch in' with a bank card as well as an Oyster card

However, other types of contactless payments have been slower to take off despite Barclaycard issuing the first such credit card in the UK in 2007.

One expert suggested TfL's move might change that.

"There are now more than 23 million contactless cards in the UK," Windsor Holden, research director at Juniper Research told the BBC.

"But surveys that we've seen suggests only a very small minority of card holders are aware that they have an NFC-enabled card.

"Projects like this bus scheme are absolutely critical if the public is to be educated about the use of these cards as having them isn't enough - it's knowing how to use them, feeling confident about the security involved and then wanting to use them more."

TfL will announce more details about its NFC proposals on Thursday.

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UK 'nation of internet shoppers'

12 December 2012 Last updated at 19:53 ET

Internet shopping is more popular in the UK than in any other major country, a survey from regulator Ofcom suggests.

Consumers in the UK spend an average of £1,083 a year on internet shopping, compared with Australia which spends the second highest at £842, it said.

The UK's fondness for net shopping is, in part, driven by mobile devices.

UK consumers are also downloading more data from their mobiles than any other nation, according to the survey.

The study also indicated that:

• In December 2011 the average UK mobile connection used 424MB (megabytes) of data, higher than Japanese users who averaged 392MBs.
• 16% of all web traffic in the UK was from mobiles, tablets or other connected devices - more than any other European country.
• Four in ten UK adults now access Facebook, Twitter and others social networks via their mobiles.
• For 18 to 24-year-olds the figures is even higher, at 62%.

The findings form part of Ofcom's seventh International Communications Market Report, which looks at the take-up, availability, price and use of broadband, landlines, mobiles, TV and radio across 17 major countries.

Brits are also the most likely to watch TV-on-demand and use digital video recorders, the report suggests.

Big TVs

UK consumers are embracing the new generation of internet-enabled TVs with 15% owning such a set, compared to 10% in the US.

Our TVs are also getting bigger - more than a third of TVs sold in the first quarter of 2012 were between 33in (84cm) and 44in (112cm).

The UK remains the cheapest place to buy communication services, although the gap is narrowing.

Ofcom said a basket of communication services - including fixed-line telephone, mobile calls and texts and fixed and mobile broadband and TV - costs on average £146 in the UK.

That was £32 cheaper than in France, £101 cheaper than Italy and £168 cheaper than the US.

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Google Maps app returns to iPhone

12 December 2012 Last updated at 23:19 ET By Leo Kelion Technology reporter

Google has released its Maps app for the iPhone, in the wake of complaints about Apple's software.

Apple controversially replaced the search giant's mapping service with its own when it released its latest handset, the iPhone 5.

The move was widely criticised after numerous mistakes were found in Apple Maps's search results.

Google's app introduces functions previously restricted to Android devices.

One analyst said it would prove popular, but added that Nokia still posed a challenge.

The Finnish company recently launched its own free maps app for the iPhone.

Continue reading the main story

Apple's mapping nightmare

When Apple announced in June that it was launching its own maps app - using licensed data and its own software - developers cheered.

But soon after it launched in September, the complaints began.

The UK's historic town Stratford-upon-Avon was missing, a farm in Dublin had been labelled as an airport and Hong Kong's Queen's Pier boat terminal was in the wrong location.

Satellite images were sometimes blurry or only showed cloud cover, and the much-vaunted Flyover facility had created surreal views of landmarks including the Brooklyn Bridge and Hoover Dam.

Facing growing criticism, Apple boss Tim Cook penned an apology acknowledging users' frustration.

It did not seem to dampen early iPhones sales, but the affair was linked to the high-profile ousting of iOS software chief Scott Forstall, who had reportedly refused to sign the apology himself.

Mr Cook recently acknowledged that the firm had "screwed up", but promised Apple had a "huge plan" to improve the app.

The firms are motivated in part by a desire to gather data automatically generated by handsets using their respective software, as well as users' own feedback.

This allows them to fine-tune their services and improve the accuracy of features such as traffic status updates.

Android's advantage

Features Google has introduced that were not available in its earlier iPhone app include:

• Voice guided turn-by-turn directions, with estimated travel times.
• Indoor panoramic images of buildings that have signed up to its Street View Business Photos service
• 3D representations of the outlines of buildings that can be viewed from different angles
• Vector-based graphics based on mathematical lines and points rather than pre-created bitmap graphics, making it quicker to zoom in and out of an area.

Among the facilities Google's iPhone app lacks that are present in its Android equivalent are indoor maps, the ability to download maps for offline viewing, and voice search.

However, over time, project manager Kai Hansen told the BBC that what was on one platform should be on the other.

"The goal is clearly to make it as unified and consistent an experience as possible," he said.

Ground Truth

One area Apple's own software still has an edge is its integration of Flyover which offers interactive photo-realistic views of selected cities using 3D-rendered graphics within its maps app.

Google offers a similar facility via Google Earth which is promoted in its main maps app, but involves switching into a separate program.

However, for many users the key feature will be the level of accuracy that Google offers.

Since 2008, the firm's Ground Truth project has mashed together licensed data with information gathered by its own fleet of Street View cars and bicycles.

The images and sensor data they collect are analysed by computers and humans to identify street signs, business names, road junctions and other key features. To date, more than five million miles (eight million km) of roads across 45 countries have been covered.

This information is supplemented by the public filing their own reports. iPhone users are encouraged to do likewise by shaking their handsets to activate a feedback function.

"Google Maps, as much as any other map application, lives from the data that we receive," Mr Hansen explained.

"If a road is closed for the next six months, or a road was opened two days ago - these are things that somebody who lives next to the road immediately notices, but if you're not in the area it becomes hard to know.

"The more we can give you the ability to let us know about things that are changing on the map, the more other users will benefit from that corrected information."

He added that once operators verify these reports, changes can be made "within minutes, rather than hours".

Continue reading the main story

Making money from maps

Google says the new iPhone app does not feature advertising - unlike some promoted results in its web browser map pages.

Suggestions for specific locations - such as restaurants or shops - are instead based on a user's search history and other information gathered from their Google account.

Google will cover some of its costs by charging certain third-party developers who embed its maps in their products.

But for now, the biggest benefit is likely to be brand loyalty, helping to drive users to its main search engine, which is profitable.

That may change in the future.

Earlier this year, Google's mapping chief Brian McClendon told the BBC that "local advertising is going to be a critical part of any mapping or local search experience" in the long term.

Apple is also seeking to improve its own data through user feedback, but risks having less to work with if iPhone users switch to another product.

There had been speculation Apple would reject Google's app from its store for this reason.

But since iPhone sales are at the heart of Apple's fortunes, it may have felt it had more to lose than gain by allowing rival Android handsets to offer a popular app it lacked.

'Neutral' Nokia

Google's launch will also have consequences for Nokia, which recently launched its own Here Maps app on iOS.

The European firm's location division is decades older than Google's, and also has a strong reputation for accuracy.

However, the Here app has had a shaky start with many users complaining about problems with its interface - a consequence of it being written in the HTML5 web language rather than as a native app, specifically for the iOS system.

Even so, one telecoms analyst said it would be premature to write the company out of the game.

"I'm not convinced Nokia as a brand for maps will become a big thing in the consumer consciousness, but what I think is going to happen is that more businesses are going to quietly do deals with it for maps," said Ben Wood from CCS Insight.

"Because of the issues that Apple had, people have suddenly understood the importance of quality mapping and they may also say they don't want to go to Google as all of the data then runs through the search firm, strengthening it as a competitor. Nokia is more of a neutral partner.

"Amazon has already done a deal with Nokia on its Kindle tablets, and I wouldn't be surprised if RIM's new Blackberry devices and Facebook follow."

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ONS website under fire from MPs

13 December 2012 Last updated at 04:00 ET By Ed Lowther Political reporter, BBC News

The official website for communicating public data in the UK is "terrible" and a "disaster", MPs have told the man responsible for the service.

Andrew Dilnot, the chairman of the UK Statistics Authority, conceded that a relaunch of the Office for National Statistics (ONS) website last year had not been "one of our greatest moments".

But he emphasised that there had been "significant" improvements recently.

A Tory MP said he had been shocked by how poor the website had become.

The UK Statistics Authority oversees the ONS, and Mr Dilnot said its board, which he chairs, was ultimately responsible for the website.

The chairman of the Commons Public Administration Committee, Bernard Jenkin, told Mr Dilnot he had heard "excoriating" evidence on the website's quality.

On Tuesday, fact-checker Will Moy of fullfact.org had told the committee that navigating official statistics websites could be like venturing onto a "magic roundabout".

'Exasperating'

"You can get lost very quickly at the ONS website," he warned the assembled MPs.

"Our official statistics producers are sitting on a treasure chest of data which can inform and illuminate our public debate, and sometimes they are literally sitting on top of them, daring you to get in.

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

The changeover to the new [ONS] website was generously described as a disaster. In fact it was probably worse than that. The journey that you're taking is one backwards, into a denial of information"

End Quote Labour MP Paul Flynn

"What they should be doing is presenting it, and saying: 'We have all this information, and it can help you; it can help you as citizens, it can help you as businesses... and this is how it can help you.'"

Michael Blastland, a freelance journalist who used to work on More or Less, the BBC Radio 4 programme examining statistical claims in political debate, had a confession for the committee.

"Just before I left [the programme] I had an idea that I'd get myself a couple of very bright maths graduates and shut them in a room and say, 'see if you can find a long-run series of data since the second world war of per-capita GDP'," he said.

"Quite an interesting little number. And you pop in every couple of days with bread and water just to check they weren't dead."

He concluded: "It is an exasperating experience."

'Open-data agenda'

Chris Giles, a senior journalist at the Financial Times, posed a seemingly straightforward question: "Is unemployment now higher or lower than it was in the mid-1990s?"

Having spent some time analysing the ONS website, he declared: "There is absolutely no way of getting an answer to that question if you are a lay person."

Even for expert users, like himself, "it takes eight clicks... that is really very, very frustrating."

The committee also grilled the minister at the Cabinet Office responsible for policy on publishing statistics, Conservative MP Nick Hurd.

Labour backbencher Paul Flynn described his performance as "sad" and "disappointing", saying the minister displayed little mastery of his brief.

"You have observed, Mr Hurd, that since you started your evidence to this committee, several Conservative members have left; whether it's embarrassment, or guilt, or..." he said, before he was interrupted by the committee chairman.

Mr Flynn added: "The changeover to the new [ONS] website was generously described as a disaster. In fact it was probably worse than that. The journey that you're taking is one backwards, into a denial of information."

Mr Hurd rejected Mr Flynn's claims, adding: "Please don't underestimate what is going on in terms of the open-data agenda, which is being driven by the Cabinet Office."

There was "widespread engagement with people who look at statistics, look at data; widespread engagement with people who want to make businesses out of that".

'Anoraks'

The comments from the committee's session on Tuesday were put to Mr Dilnot when he appeared before it on Wednesday.

He revealed a degree of nostalgia for the former ONS website, which he said he had bookmarked in his browser long before being appointed to the top job at the UK Statistics Authority.

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

I'd encourage you to go back and have another go at the search engine, because I think it is now much improved"

End Quote Andrew Dilnot

"Four of five years ago, I thought it did what then seemed to be a good job. I've said repeatedly that we have in this country marvellous data, an extraordinarily rich array of professionally produced statistics," he told MPs.

"The relaunch of the ONS website in August of last year was not one of our greatest moments, and at that time the website became difficult to use, difficult to navigate, difficult to search."

He said the ONS web team had made "significant progress" towards resolving the problems, particularly by improving the search function in the past fortnight.

But Conservative MP Charlie Elphicke seized upon the admission, declaring that the problems with the website had been "endlessly frustrating" and "shocking to all of us who are anoraks".

"Would you accept it's been pretty terrible, it needs a lot of improvement, and you're on the case? And the search is just awful, and that needs improvement?" he asked.

"Are you going to say to us, we get it and we're on the case?"

"Absolutely," replied Mr Dilnot, pointing to the progress being made, adding that before appearing before the MPs he had tried to defeat the new search function, but without success.

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Deported McAfee lands back in US

13 December 2012 Last updated at 04:35 ET

Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play.

John McAfee told reporters his "next step is to rest", as Daniela Ritorto reports

The software tycoon John McAfee has arrived in the United States after being deported by Guatemala.

He landed in Miami, after being escorted to the airport in Guatemala City and placed on board an American Airlines flight.

Mr McAfee said before leaving he was "perfectly happy with the decision".

He was detained a week ago after fleeing from Belize, where he is wanted for questioning in connection with the murder of a neighbour.

The 67-year-old has denied any role in the killing. The authorities in Belize say he is not a suspect in the investigation.

He has spent more than a month on the run with his girlfriend, blogging about his exploits.

As he left Guatemala City, Mr McAfee said he was happy to be going home.

"I've been running through jungles and rivers and oceans and I think I need to rest for a while. And I've been in jail for seven days," he said.

He said he had no immediate plans when he reached Florida, only that he was going "to hang in Miami for a while".

Passengers on the same flight as Mr McAfee said that he had been taken off the plane before everyone else.

A spokesman for Miami International Airport said he would be escorted by federal authorities after clearing customs. It was not immediately clear where he was heading or what his legal status was.

Paranoid

In an interview with Bloomberg Television ahead of his departure, Mr McAfee said he wanted to apologise to the Guatemalan president for putting him in an awkward position during negotiations on a territorial dispute with Belize.

His lawyers blocked an extradition request from Belize, where he has been named a "person of interest" in the murder of Florida businessman Gregory Faull.

Mr McAfee says he is happy to talk to Belize police but did not want to be remanded in their custody.

He claims he is being persecuted by the authorities in Belize, whom he accuses of corruption.

Belize Prime Minister Dean Barrow had a more prosaic explanation: "I don't want to be unkind to the gentleman, but I believe he is extremely paranoid, even bonkers."

Belize police spokesman Raphael Martinez said Belize's extradition treaty with the US extended only to suspected criminals, a designation that did not currently apply to Mr McAfee.

"Right now, we don't have enough information to change his status from person of interest to suspect," he said.

After making his fortune from the anti-virus software which bears his name, Mr McAfee has lived an eccentric life, funding start-ups, flying small planes low over the desert, and most recently, attempting to synthesise antibiotics from jungle plants in Belize.

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Leveson blogs and tweets warning

13 December 2012 Last updated at 04:54 ET

The law should be enforced against tweeters and bloggers to avoid a drop in mainstream journalistic standards, Lord Justice Leveson has said.

In a speech in Australia, he said there was a "pernicious and false" belief that the law did not apply online.

This undermined the rule of law and could lead to journalists cutting corners in order to "steal a march" on their online competitors.

Creative thinking was needed to ensure the law was applied equally, he said.

Lord Justice Leveson, whose report into the press was published last month, is taking part in a lecture tour, although he has ruled out commenting on the report itself.

'Electronic pub gossip'

During a speech at the University of Melbourne, he insisted there was an important difference between mainstream journalists with "a powerful reputation for accuracy" and bloggers and tweeters who were "no more than electronic versions of pub gossip".

But, he said, there was a danger that a perception online competitors were operating without legal restraints could damage wider journalistic standards and "lead to journalists adopting an approach which was less than scrupulous in the pursuit of stories".

He said: "In order to steal a march on bloggers and tweeters, they might be tempted to cut corners, to break or at least bend the law to obtain information for stories or to infringe privacy improperly to the same end.

"It may encourage unethical, and potentially, unlawful practices to get a story.

"In a culture which sees some act with impunity in the face of the civil law, and the criminal law, a general decline in standards may arise."

It could also lead to some newspapers deciding to publish entirely online and moving abroad to avoid UK law, although this was unlikely in the near future, he added.

He called for creative thinking on making sure the law was applied equally and more international co-operation to enforce standards.

"It might be said that if we facilitate or condone breaches of the law, and thereby weaken the rule of law by failing to act and to recognise judgements and court orders which emanate from other countries, we encourage the weakening of the rule of law at home too," he said.

"If we are to ensure that appropriate standards are maintained, we must meet those challenges, and ensure that the media not only remains subject to the law but that it is not placed at a disadvantage where the enforcement of the law is concerned.

"We will therefore have to think creatively about how we ensure that the law is capable of equal application, and is applied equally and fairly, against the mainstream media and bloggers, tweeters and other amateur online journalists."

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Paperless tickets 'not practical'

By Amelia Butterly
Newsbeat reporter Radiohead experienced problems with paperless ticketing earlier this year

Paperless tickets could help combat touts but many venues still do not have the capabilities to support them, say independent music promoters.

Although most tickets are sold online, bringing a printed barcode ticket means it is not truly a digital transaction.

But one independent promoter Anton Lockwood, who works for DHP, says paperless is not always "practical".

Continue reading the main story

Ticketmaster defines a paperless ticket as one where the credit card used to book the tickets is brought, along with ID, to the venue for entry. At some venues you may have to bring a printout with a reference number or barcode for scanning, hence why they may not be truly paperless.

"It only works where the cost of introducing the system can be spread over high ticket prices," he said.

"The physical design of arenas can make paperless tickets much easier to handle but in club venues, for example, it's more difficult as there isn't usually the space for equipment like electronic turnstiles."

Dave Newton of We Got Tickets, an online retailer, believes that the technology has actually made it easier for small venues.

"Paperless ticketing has brought the cost down [for smaller venues and promoters] and opened up the option of advanced ticketing," he said.

"Resistance is still there at the larger venues because they're used to having people stood on the door ripping tickets."

'Artist-led'

The benefits of going paperless include the chance for streamlined venue entry and the opportunity to control resales and touting.

New wristbands can be scanned at festivals across the UK

There are downsides though, which were demonstrated in September after Radiohead fans had problems claiming or returning their paperless purchases.

A spokesperson from Ticketmaster says that paperless ticketing is an "artist-led initiative" and they say it's up to the musicians and their promoters whether they use physical tickets or not.

He said: "Following the recent set of dates at The O2 for Robbie Williams, a survey that we [Ticketmaster] completed suggested that 87% were satisfied with their experience of paperless.

"Fans agreed that it is the future of ticketing."

New technology

Other technologies, such as electronic wristbands and smartphone apps, may be the way that paperless ticketing is rolled out across the industry.

Continue reading the main story

Resistance is still there at the larger venues because they're used to having people stood on the door ripping tickets

Dave Newton We Got Tickets

Dave Newton thinks that when marketing companies capitalise more on the tagging, social media and promotion capabilities, tickets may go completely digital as a way for them to "capture that data" and create "up-sell opportunities".

Technologies are also being developed for when people have actually arrived at the gig venue.

One of those includes inaudible frequencies, sounds that can be played out of speakers at gigs that cannot be heard by people but can be picked up by smartphones.

Theoretically the noise trigger could then make the smartphone bring up all kinds of content from merchandising or ticket purchase options or play video.

New innovations may also change the way people buy tickets in the future and how music fans experience the gig once they are actually there.

Fans were satisfied with the paperless tickets at Robbie William's last concert

Follow @BBCNewsbeat on Twitter

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