Consumer Electronics Daily News

CEA Hails FCC’s Channel Sharing Report and Order

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) today approved a Report and Order that provides a regulatory framework for channel sharing among television licensees in connection with incentive spectrum auctions.

Gary Shapiro, president and CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA)^®, released the following statement regarding this regulatory action:

“The nation’s spectrum crisis is real and it is here. The FCC’s action today is a key step toward ensuring that additional spectrum for wireless broadband is available so that all Americans can enjoy the robust mobile broadband networks that our nation so desperately needs.

“We applaud the FCC for its efforts to help our nation move forward toward more efficient use of valuable spectrum. We have only just begun the journey. I urge full cooperation from all stakeholders in the broadcast, wireless and manufacturing communities as we unleash the limitless potential of wireless broadband.”

NRF Urges FTC to Move Cautiously on Mobile Payments

The National Retail Federation today urged the Federal Trade Commission to move cautiously in establishing regulations for mobile payments, and said any rules that are adopted should parallel those for the underlying form of payment and not be specific to the technology.

“Mobile technology and processes are just beginning to emerge and we won’t know which practices the public will like or what methods will provide new benefits until the technology begins to coalesce,” NRF Senior Vice President and General Counsel Mallory Duncan said. “The government should not impose regulations that would forestall yet-to-be-imagined advances and innovation in order to avoid potential ‘harm’ based largely on speculation.”

“Some of the best innovations on the Internet today might have been suspect a generation ago but today they are benefits few consumers would want to live without,” Duncan said. “The public very often embraces change as the ‘future’ becomes ‘now.’ Familiarity breeds content.”

Duncan is scheduled to participate in an FTC workshop on mobile payments today called “Paper, Plastic… or Mobile?” as part of a panel discussion on privacy issues.

Duncan noted that a phone itself is “just a device, not a payment” and that actual payment could take place via a credit or debit card, directly from a bank account, be processed through the user’s phone bill, or be made through other means. Any privacy rules developed for mobile payments should be no more restrictive than those for the underlying form of payment, he said.

“Retailers have always wanted to know their customers so they can serve them better and that doesn’t change simply because the method of payment changes,” Duncan said. “Mobile might help retailers get to know their customers more like they knew their customers generations ago, and offer more personalized service.”

Duncan said federal officials need to address a number of issues including a definition of what constitutes a mobile payment. While the term is largely used to mean a payment made in a bricks-and-mortar store using a smartphone, officials need to decide whether a payment made for an online purchase on the same device constitutes a mobile payment, or if payments made on a portable device like an iPad tablet or a laptop computer are “mobile.”

As the world’s largest retail trade association and the voice of retail worldwide, NRF represents retailers of all types and sizes, including chain restaurants and industry partners, from the United States and more than 45 countries abroad. Retailers operate more than 3.6 million U.S. establishments that support one in four U.S. jobs – 42 million working Americans. Contributing $2.5 trillion to annual GDP, retail is a daily barometer for the nation’s economy. NRF’s Retail Means Jobs campaign emphasizes the economic importance of retail and encourages policymakers to support a Jobs, Innovation and Consumer Value Agenda aimed at boosting economic growth and job creation. www.nrf.com

NETGEAR Introduces Industry's First 802.11ac WiFi Router

NETGEAR®, Inc., a global networking company that delivers innovative products to consumers, businesses and service providers, today announced the availability of the NETGEAR R6300 WiFi Router; the first 802.11ac dual band gigabit WiFi router enabling 5th generation WiFi (5G WiFi) at gigabit speeds. The router is also backwards compatible with 802.11a/b/g/n which provides optimum interoperability with legacy WiFi devices.

The NETGEAR R6300 WiFi Router, powered by Broadcom's 5G WiFi IEEE 802.11ac chips, is up to three times faster than today's 802.11n routers. With an elegant new design that fits perfectly in consumers' living spaces, the router increases the coverage area for HD streaming in the home. The NETGEAR R6300 WiFi Router has speeds of up to 1300 Mbps on 5GHz and 450 Mbps on 2.4GHz enabling consumers to download web content from any device in the home in a fraction of the time it would take on a similar 802.11n device.   

The upcoming 802.11ac wireless standard is the world's fastest WiFi, providing gigabit WiFi speeds allowing for web content to download faster, and large video or music files to synch more quickly. The increased speed of 802.11ac technology is ideal for mobile devices, like smartphones and tablets, by providing three times the performance for a similar amount of battery consumption of devices utilizing the current 802.11n WiFi standard.

Other advanced features of the NETGEAR R6300 WiFi Router include:

• NETGEAR Genie®: This free app for PCs, Macs, iOS and Android smartphones and tablets enables home users to control, monitor, repair, and manage their home networks easily through a simple, elegant dashboard. NETGEAR customers can download the utility at http://www.netgear.com/genie or from the Google Play or App Store.
• NETGEAR MyMedia™: The NETGEAR Genie mobile app feature provides the ability to find photos, video or music files anywhere on the network and play them on a DLNA media player.
• AirPrint ™ Support: The NETGEAR Genie app enables users to print on any USB or networked printer directly from an iPad or iPhone.
• Guest network access: The NETGEAR Genie app makes setting up a guest network simple. Guests and visitors can go online through the router without the need for secure login information. The guest network also prevents users from seeing and accessing a household's computers, printers, storage devices and other home network devices.
• ReadySHARE® Printer: Makes it easy to turn any existing USB printer into a fully functional networked printer that is fully compatible with Macs and PCs.
• Media Server-DLNA: The R6300 Router is DLNA ready and can stream to any DLNA compatible device in your house, including the latest Smart TVs, Blu-ray players, media players, game consoles, handheld devices, tablets and more.
• NETGEAR Live Parental Controls: Centralized, flexible, and reliable parental control solution for all the devices on the network, including Macs, Windows PCs, smartphones and tablets, for a safe online environment for children and teenagers. No subscription is required.
• Automatic WiFi Security: Comes with wireless security turned on out-of-the-box, complete with a pre-configured network name and password, protecting home WiFi networks by default.
• Easy Installation: No CD required so users can set it up with smartphones, tablets, ultrabooks, and even MacBook Air. 
• 2 USB ports: To simultaneously support USB storage and USB printer on the router.

 

"802.11ac is the next-generation of WiFi connectivity and is set to revolutionize the way we consume content wirelessly by delivering Internet speeds up to three times faster than consumers are used to experiencing," said David Henry, vice president of product management, retail products at NETGEAR. "NETGEAR's leadership in the industry, and collaboration with Broadcom to introduce the first 802.11ac router, will future proof your network by ensuring your home is capable of supporting new faster 802.11ac devices as they begin to roll out this year."

Pricing and Availability
The NETGEAR R6300 WiFi Router will be available in May starting at $199.99.

Honeywell Portable Cooling Solutions and Electrical Accessories to Premier at 2012 National Hardware Show

JMA North America will introduce new Honeywell portable cooling solutions and electrical accessories including rechargeable energy lights and solar charging solutions at the 2012 National Hardware Show in Las Vegas, May 1 - 3.

The mobile air conditioners serve a wide range of consumer needs. Their European designs bring a contemporary look to products that help provide portable, mobile comfort. All portable air conditioning products use Honeywell's AZ20 brand of R410A refrigerant, the refrigerant of choice for non-ozone depleting air conditioning. The products feature feather-touch controls that are very easy to use. The products also operate as a highly efficient heat pump.

The electrical accessories feature a number of innovative designs, including energy saving Standby Power Savers. These automatically eliminate the wasteful standby power of multiple devices with the single click of a button on the TV remote control. Smart Chargers can power from one to six portable devices and can shut off power when charging is complete. Unique portable solar charging products let consumers take advantage of their portable devices even while camping far from the power grid. The products are designed to meet the unique needs of end users rather than being business applications.

Portable cooling products are available for immediate shipment and the electrical accessory lines will be available to ship in the fall.

To learn more about these new products, visit JMA at the National Hardware Show, booth #3619 Central Hall.

JMA North America is the US division of Jmatek International Corporation, and is the exclusive Honeywell licensee for portable air cooling and electrical accessories. Jmatek has years of selling cooling solutions and electrical products around the world and is now bringing these proven products to North America with designs tailored to US consumer needs. The division will be led by Mr. Giacomo Calzavara, who brings over 25 years of experience with seasonal comfort appliances while employed by DeLonghi America Inc. The new company will have its main office located in Ramsey, New Jersey. For more information contact please contact Giacomo Calzavara at +1-201-749-3552 or by email at [email protected].

For more information about Jmatek International Corporation, please visit www.jmana.us. The Honeywell Trademark is used under license from Honeywell International Inc.

iPhone 4S Hits Record High Activations While iPads Continue To Dominate Enterprise Tablet Activations

Good Technology, the leading provider of secure and managed enterprise mobility and collaboration tools for a range of mobile devices, today released its quarterly device activation report for the first quarter of 2012. The full report provides a breakdown of smartphone and tablet devices activated amongst Good's enterprise customers, which include eight of the top 10 financial institutions, seven of the top 10 healthcare organizations, half of the Fortune 100, and companies from every major industry. The results demonstrate that companies continue to embrace the 'bring your own device' (BYOD) trend and accept new devices into the enterprise.

The Q1 findings showed that Apple's iPhone 4S hit a record high, claiming the number one device spot overall, with 37 percent of all activations for the first quarter (four times that of any other device). The iPad™ 2 claimed the second spot overall, with 17.7 percent of activations for the quarter.  With less than one month on the market, the new iPad™, released in March 2012, rocketed to the number four spot with 4.3 percent of all activations for the quarter, and an impressive 12.1 percent of activations in March alone.

Amongst Android™ devices, the Motorola Droid™ took the top spot, with 1.6 percent of all activations, making it the seventh most popular device for the quarter. Overall, Android smartphones represented 26.1 percent of all activations for the quarter, while Android tablets came in at 2.7 percent.

BYOD and Tablets Drive Substantial Year-over-Year and Quarter-over-Quarter Activation Growth for Good

As the leader in enabling BYOD, Good Technology is seeing rapid growth in both the quantity and size of its customers' deployments.  The number of Good customers deploying iOS and/or Android devices grew by more than 50 percent over the past 12 months, while the average Good customer deployment size more than doubled over the same period.  Even more impressive, in Q1 2012 alone, Good's activations grew by 50 percent over Q4 2011, and were nearly double the two previous quarters combined.

"BYOD smartphones and tablets combined with proactive, company-owned iPad deployments are driving rapid growth both the size and number of new deployments amongst our customers," said John Herrema, Good Technology's SVP of Corporate Strategy. "This includes significant growth in the number of Good users who have both a smartphone and a tablet, with the iPhone 4S and iPad 2 as the most frequently occurring combination."

Enterprise Users Driving Tablet Adoption

A recent Gartner press release[1] forecasts 118.9 million tablets will be sold this year. Good found that iPads collectively represented roughly 97.3 percent of its tablet activations for Q1 2012. Apple's continued growth is not only being driven by consumers and the overall BYOD trend, but also by proactive enterprise deployment of iPads. Apple's iPhones and iPads remain the clear choice amongst end users when it comes to both BYOD and large company-driven deployments in verticals such as Financial Services, Business and Professional Services, Life Sciences and Healthcare.

Life Sciences witnessed the highest rate of growth in the quarter for iPad net activations by industry, steadily increasing from less than three percent in October 2011 to nearly 14 percent in January 2012. This growth mirrors anecdotal data around proactive iPad deployments to sales forces in that industry, most notably among Pharmaceutical and Biotech companies.

"With Windows 8, we expect more competition for Apple® and the iPad in the enterprise tablet space, especially for proactive, company-owned device deployments," said John Herrema, Good Technology's SVP Corporate Strategy. "On the smartphone side, we just released support for Windows Phone 7.5 last week and it will be interesting to see how it performs over the coming quarters."

Latin America's Mobile Penetration Rate to Reach 130 Percent by End of 2015

Despite Latin America's high mobile penetration rate, the market is far from saturated, driving operators to find new ways to capture the business of mobile users – one of the various topics Latin America service providers will discuss at the Rio Wireless International Conference on May 21 & 22, 2012. For more information, click here: http://www.riowireless.com.br/site.

"Mobile penetration in Latin America is already extremely high at 109 percent at year-end of 2011," says Vinicius Caetano, Senior Analyst for Pyramid Research, who will present research at Rio Wireless. "The reason behind the high penetration in Latin America lies on the pre-paid segment that often requires no minimum permanence contract; that makes it easier for users who want to change providers without cancelling the current subscription and for users that want to benefit from lower prices to have multiple subscriptions with different providers," he explains. "Therefore, a high penetration of subscribers does not translate into a high penetration of actual users."

"The mobile market in the region is far from being considered saturated; in fact, Pyramid expects the region to achieve 130 percent penetration by the end of 2015," Caetano says. "This provides an opportunity for service providers to focus on customer retention programs, strategies aimed at moving subscriptions from prepaid to postpaid, and the introduction of new services and applications that can be sold to existing subscribers," he adds. "Our upcoming Rio Wireless conference is designed to capture the amazing mobile opportunity in Latin America, and will be the place where market leaders can gather research-driven content that will focus on the region's mobile trends."

"The Light Reading Communications Network and Network Eventos have partnered to expand the conference's reach beyond Brazil's borders by providing an ideal platform for service providers seeking strategic advice as they develop their businesses in Latin America," says Joseph Braue, Executive Vice President/Group Director of the Light Reading Communications Network. "By combining Network Eventos' expertise in producing successful Brazilian telecom events with Pyramid's market growth analysis and Heavy Reading's telecom technology expertise, we can provide a conference of tremendous substance for regional telecom executives and regulators."

Executives from Oi/Telema, ITU, Ministry of Communications, VIVO, Sinditelebrasil and others plan to participate on the various panels scheduled during this two-day conference. To view the agenda, list of speakers and to register, click here: http://www.riowireless.com.br/site.

International CES Call for Speakers Opens May 1

The 2013 International CES® Conferences Call for Speakers will open May 1 this year and run through June 12. Don’t miss this prestigious opportunity to be involved in the CES Conferences speaker program for the 2013 CES.

The Call for Speakers focuses on 25+ sessions targeting some of the hottest topics in technology today and in the future. These sessions, combined with tracks produced by our conference partners, brings the talents and expertise of 900 speakers to the CES conference program that delivers 300 educational sessions to CES attendees covering the full range of topics relevant to the consumer electronics (CE) industry.

Detailed information, including the 2013 CES conference sessions descriptions, will be available May 1 on the CES conference program website. Be part of the educational program at the largest annual tradeshow for consumer electronics technology.

Microsoft Security Intelligence Report Warns of Ongoing Conficker Threat and Clarifies Reality of Targeted Attacks

Microsoft Corp. today released the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report volume 12 (SIRv12), which found that the Conficker worm was detected approximately 220 million times worldwide in the past two and a half years, making it one of the biggest ongoing threats to enterprises. The study also revealed the worm continues to spread because of weak or stolen passwords and vulnerabilities for which a security update exists.

According to the SIRv12, quarterly detections of the Conficker worm have increased by more than 225 percent since the beginning of 2009. In the fourth quarter of 2011 alone, Conficker was detected on 1.7 million systems worldwide. In examining the reasons behind Conficker's prevalence in organizations, research showed that 92 percent of Conficker infections were a result of weak or stolen passwords, and 8 percent of infections exploited vulnerabilities for which a security update exists.

"Conficker is one of the biggest security problems we face, yet it is well within our power to defend against," said Tim Rains, director of Microsoft Trustworthy Computing. "It is critically important that organizations focus on the security fundamentals to help protect against the most common threats."

The SIRv12 also revealed that many of the threats often referred to as Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) are no more advanced or sophisticated than other types of attacks. In most cases, these attacks leverage known vectors such as exploiting weak or stolen passwords and vulnerabilities for which security updates exist, but their success lies in the persistence and determination in trying different tactics to compromise the target. This is why Microsoft refers to these types of threats as Targeted Attacks performed by Determined Adversaries, rather than APTs.

"Labeling cyberthreats as 'advanced' is often times misleading and can divert organizations' attention away from addressing basic security issues, which can prevent more common threats from infiltrating their systems," Rains said. "Most attacks do not possess new, super-advanced techniques or technology as the APT label implies; in the majority of cases, they simply exploit weak or stolen passwords or vulnerabilities for which a security update exists and employ social engineering."

Microsoft recommends that customers and businesses adhere to the following security fundamentals to help ensure they are protected:

• Use strong passwords and educate employees on their importance
• Keep systems up to date by regularly applying available updates for all products
• Use antivirus software from a trusted source
• Invest in newer products with a higher quality of software protection
• Consider the cloud as a business resource

"With organizations being presented with significant amounts of data and media reports on cyberthreats, the Microsoft Security Intelligence Report volume 12 gives us good perspective on recent trends in the global threat landscape," said Bob Rodger, global head of IT Infrastructure Security at HSBC. "The report, in combination with other sources of intelligence, assists us to more accurately and effectively invest, prioritize and make informed decisions about our security infrastructure to ensure that our business continues to be optimally protected from threats."

For businesses, as Scott Charney, corporate vice president of Microsoft Trustworthy Computing, outlined in his keynote presentation at RSA 2012, Microsoft recommends a more holistic approach to risk management to help protect against both broad-based and targeted attacks, including the following:

• Prevention. Employ security fundamentals and pay close attention to configuration management and timely security update deployment.
• Detection. Carefully monitor and perform advanced analysis to identify threats. Keep abreast of security events and leverage credible sources of security intelligence.
• Containment. If the targeted organization has configured its environment with targeted attacks by determined adversaries in mind, it is possible to contain the attacker's activities and thereby buy time to detect, respond to and mitigate the attack. To contain an attack, consideration should be given to architecting domain administration models that limit the availability of administrator credentials and apply available technologies, such as IPsec-based network encryption, to restrict unnecessary interconnectivity on the network.
• Recovery. It is important to have a well-conceived recovery plan, supported by suitably skilled incident response capability. Maintain a "crisis committee" to set response priorities and engage in exercises to test the organization's ability to recover from different attack scenarios.

Microsoft produces the SIR twice per year to keep the industry informed on the changing threat landscape and provide actionable guidance for customers in an effort to create safer more trusted computing experiences for everyone. The latest report, volume 12, provides insight into online threat data with new information for July 2011 through December 2011 and analysis of data from more than 100 countries and regions around the world. More information about SIRv12 is available at http://www.microsoft.com/sir.

Samsung Introduces World’s Thinnest Optical Disc Drive for Ultrabooks and Tablets

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., a worldwide leader in digital consumer electronics and information technology, announced today its new slim external DVD writer, the SE-218BB optical disc drive (ODD) that sets the industry standard for ultra portable drives.

Built to accompany a new generation of ultrabook and slim laptop designs, the SE-218BB features a compact size that is 18% thinner than conventional DVD writers and is the world’s thinnest external optical disc drive with a 14mm height. The drive is 8% lighter than Samsung’s conventional DVD writer and built to accommodate today’s mobile lifestyle.

“With its ultra small footprint, consumers will appreciate the SE-218BB sleek drive as an ideal companion for ultrabook users that quickly connects and is USB powered to access content wherever they are,” said Maverick Choi, ODD senior manager, Samsung Semiconductor, Inc. “Through its AV connectivity mode, the drive is also ideal for Tablet PC users that want to view or hear content from a disc.”

Using Smart Power technology, SE-218BB connects through its single USB port to power the drive and provide AV connectivity to PCs and notebook computers. For Tablet PCs with a built-in USB port and supporting Android Honeycomb OS 3.1 or above, the SE-218BB allows users on-the-go to watch DVD content on their tablets.

The SE-218BB DVD writer is engineered to be compatible with all major operating systems, including Win7 and Mac OS. Featuring Buffer Under Run technology, the drive works to prevent errors that result from writing speeds that can exceed data transfer speeds, while also enabling PC multi-tasking.

The SE-218BB DVD writer is an eco-friendly product, manufactured with lead-free soldering technology that eliminates harmful materials such as Pb, cd, cr+6, Hg, PBBs and PBDE.

The external DVD drive is capable of reading and writing files at a variety of speeds across different data media types including: 24X CD-ROM, 24X CD-RW, 8X DVD±R recording, 5X DVD-RAM recording, 6X DVD+R Dual Layer recording, 6X DVD-R Dual Layer recording, 8X DVD+RW recording and 6X DVD-RW recording.

The SE-218BB is available now worldwide at online retail outlets with a MSRP of US$ 59.99. For more information please visit www.samsungodd.com.

Sophia Offers Many Ways to Learn Online with More Than 25,000 Free Academic Tutorials Created For Students

Sophia is continuing to customize the way students learn with its newly updated online platform that now offers more than 25,000 free academic tutorials taught in a variety of ways by hundreds of teachers and education enthusiasts. The enhanced ad-free platform also offers learning paths and quizzes in several subject areas including math, science and English, and provides students with the ability to assess their learning preference so they can choose content that helps them learn the way they learn best.

"With 25 million monthly online searches for 'help with math' and millions of additional searches on other academic subjects, it shows that students want and need access to credible content that is easily accessible on the Web," said Steve Anastasi, interim CEO of Sophia. "Sophia puts a fence around credible content and organizes it in a way that not only provides help with concepts taught in many ways but also has the ability to lead students on a learning journey in a particular subject."

Sophia offers more than 25,000 tutorials – bite-sized lessons created by a multitude of experts – on a variety of topics that feature a mixture of text, audio, video, slideshows and more. In addition, there are multiple tutorials on a single concept, providing students with many ways to learn. Soon the site will provide recommendations to students based on the types of tutorials they've used (much like Amazon or Pandora) that will lead them to additional lessons on a certain topic or move them to the next lesson within a subject area.

In addition, students now have the ability to complete a short learning assessment that helps determine their learning preference.

"There are a few key critical aspects that separate Sophia from other academic resources on the web," said Anastasi. "First, the size of our tutorial library and the breadth of content that covers several academic subjects including math, science, English and more makes Sophia one of the more robust resources available for parents, teachers and students of all ages. Second, our tutorials come from hundreds of excellent teachers, rather than one or two experts. And finally, Sophia makes it easy for every teacher everywhere not only to leverage our tutorial library, but to easily contribute their own tutorials – all for free."

Sophia Provides Tools for Flipping the Classroom and Pathways for Learning

Sophia launched in public beta in March 2011 and since then teachers have increasingly used the platform to flip their classroom by assigning tutorials for students to watch as homework and then providing one-on-one assistance during class time.

When flipping the class, teachers have the ability to develop their own content, choose from Sophia's library of more than 25,000 tutorials or use its newly developed Pathways feature. The Pathways feature includes a variety of learning paths – full curriculums meeting standards-aligned objectives that can take a student through an entire semester of material for a multitude of topics. Each learning path contains hundreds of tutorials, with at least five different teachers for each concept who all teach the material in different ways.

"Education is changing and we believe it is important to offer students many ways to learn by giving them the opportunity to hear from multiple teachers on a single concept," Anastasi said. "We are reversing the traditional classroom model of one teacher for many students by providing many teachers for each student."

Sophia was created in 2010 by a team of online education pioneers, academic advisers and digital innovators who have a vision to transform education from a one-size-fits-all model to a place where every student succeeds by having access to lessons that appeal to their individual learning preference. Sophia provides this in a platform that is available to anyone, anywhere, free of charge and is made possible by Capella Education Company, which supports improving access to education by using innovation to lower the cost.

To learn more, visit www.sophia.org.