cells

Restaurant offers cell phone bribe

A meal isn't a meal without a cell phone.

You need to photograph the food and get it onto your Twitter feed, before any of the other diners does the same. It isn't called A Twitter "feed" for nothing, you know.

You need to be able to Google "the collected works of Al Green," just in case there's a dispute about who wrote "Let's Stay Together."

And you need it to go on Wine Spectator's site to check just how many points this haughty little Grenache Noir might have earned for its reticence.

Then along comes some upstart restaurant in, of all places, Los Angeles to try and take your iPhone away from you. Worse, this place is prepared to bribe you.… Read more

Protect yourself from smishing (video)

We've all heard about phishing attacks -- those spammy e-mails you get in your in-box imploring you to divulge your personal information. Now those annoying scams are coming to a cell phone near you -- it's called smishing, or phishing via SMS text message.

Text messaging is the most common nonvoice use of a mobile phone, and scam artists are taking full advantage of that. In fact, according to security firm Cloudmark , about 30 million smishing messages are sent to cell phone users across North America, Europe, and the U.K. Smishing is part of the much larger … Read more

Federal court OKs warrantless cell phone tracking by police

A federal court has ruled that warrantless cell phone tracking by police is legal.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit yesterday ruled (PDF) that law enforcement officials were within their legal right to track Melvin Skinner, an alleged drug trafficker, through his cell phone before his arrest in 2006. According to court documents, law enforcement officials were able to use the GPS feature on Skinner's cell phone to track his whereabouts and eventually arrest him.

According to the court, Skinner was convicted of two counts of drug trafficking and another of conspiracy to commit money … Read more

Kyocera Rise with Android 4.0 comes to Sprint, Virgin Mobile

Sprint and Virgin Mobile announced today that they will carry the Kyocera Rise, a slideout QWERTY keyboard phone that we first caught a glimpse of in May during CTIA 2012.

In addition to its four-row keyboard, the Rise runs on Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. It has a 3.5-inch LCD display, a 1,500mAh li-ion battery (which roughly translates to 8.5 hours of reported talk time), and a 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor.

The handset also has a 3.2-megapixel rear-facing camera with accompanying flash, and an Eco Mode feature that allows users to customize and conserve battery … Read more

LG Optimus L3 misses the mark

Back in February during MWC 2012, we first caught a glimpse of LG's line of midrange Android handsets. The L7 boasted the best specs of the L-style family (it has a 1GHz processor, 4.3-inch display, and 5-megapixel camera), while the L5 followed close behind.

Recently, CNET UK reviewed the most entry-level member of the series, the LG Optimus L3. It has a 3.2-inch screen with 240x320-pixel resolution, and unlike its bigger brothers, runs on the outdated Android 2.3 Gingerbread OS. In addition, it has a 800MHz CPU and a disappointing 3-megapixel camera.

Though it isn't … Read more

ZTE reaches high with Grand X

Though it doesn't boast any flagship specs, the ZTE Grand X is one of the more ambitious phones coming out of the Chinese phone manufacturer yet. CNET UK recently reviewed the handset, and was pleased to see that it ran a skinless version of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. In addition, it sports a dual-core 1GHz Nvidia Tegra 2 processor and comes preloaded with Nvidia's Tegra Zone gaming portal.

There are some pitfalls, however. The Grand X's 4.3-inch screen is unresponsive, and its 5-megapixel camera has noticeable shutter lag. And despite ZTE touting that the … Read more

Hands-on with the Republic Wireless Motorola Defy XT

Late last year, Republic Wireless made a big splash by offering an Android smartphone with unlimited calling, texting, and data for the unheard-of price of $19 per month.

There were a few catches, of course, most notably the phone itself: LG's Optimus S, a small, decidedly entry-level model with a scratch-prone screen and slow processor.

This month, the company dumped the Optimus in favor of a new model: the Motorola Defy XT. How does it compare? I've spent the last week or so finding out.

In terms of specs alone, the Defy XT blows the Optimus S out … Read more

Man butt dials 911 during alleged drug deal

Sometimes life does not want to bring you luck.

And sometimes it delivers a perverse sort of justice, one that makes you question just who or what is in control of this world.

Such sentiments might have entered the thought systems of Justin Kryzanowski, a 24-year-old man from Pennsylvania, who is said to have patched in an accidental guest to an alleged drug deal.

With perhaps the wrong twitch of a cheek or the inadvertent pressure of a jean seam, his cell phone allegedly and independently dialed 911, and police say they listened in to the whole thing.

According the the Scranton Times-Tribune, … Read more

Wireless industry attorney: San Francisco phone law 'laughable'

Updated at 12:56 p.m. PT: with additional information and background

An attorney representing the wireless industry said Thursday that San Francisco's attempt at educating the public about cell phone radiation was "laughable," asking the court to put a hold on the city's ordinance requiring cell phone merchants to distribute the materials until the industry is able to challenge the information.

The city's representatives continued to stand behind the ordinance, adopted in 2010, that created these fact sheets.

The two sides laid out their arguments before a judge during a hearing in the federal … Read more