Smartphone

In the wake of big storms recently, the National Association of Broadcasters and the FCC has piled the pressure on Apple to enable the FM radio in iPhones so they might be used for emergency broadcasts.

FCC chairman Ajit Pai went as far as issuing a statement saying that "Apple is the one major phone manufacturer that has resisted" enabling FM chips in its phones. There's just one problem, as Apple points out. The iPhone simply doesn't have an FM chip to enable.

After a period of beta testing, Google's new parental control system for Android and iOS -- Family Link -- has been launched to the public. Google says that the feature makes "Android better for kids and families," and it places parents in control of what their kids can do.

The feature is available to everyone in the US without the need for an invite (the beta period was invite-only), and Google describes the tools as being a way to bring kids and their parents into the Android ecosystem. It can be used from an Android phone or an iPhone to control kids' use of an Android device.

There are few smartphones that attract as much attention as a new OnePlus flagship. And it is easy to understand why. You get pretty much everything that you expect from a flagship device, but at a fraction of the cost. That recipe has not changed with this year's OnePlus 5.

Though it has not changed dramatically on the outside, the new "flagship killer" is more powerful and exciting than ever. It's also more expensive, which brings up an interesting question: Is the OnePlus 5 still special in today's crowded market?

British mobile users are putting their personal details at risk by keeping large amounts of information on unsecured mobile devices, new research has warned.

Security firm Bitdefender has revealed a report showing that almost half of users in the UK store their sensitive personal and private information on smartphones that are often neither updated or protected.

Gretel is not a company name you easily forget as it is associated with one of the more popular Grimm’s brothers fairy tales, Hansel and Gretel, one which features a house made out of cookies, biscuits, cake and chocolate and inhabited by a cannibalistic witch.

This is likely to be the most memorable aspect of the GT6000. It is Gretel's flagship model. Sadly, with a quad-core processor and a component list that fits more into an entry level smartphone, it is likely to face some stiff competition from an ever bulging list of rivals

The Chinese smartphone market works in such a way that its insularity has caused the number of small vendors to surge over the past three years, all competing for the hundreds of millions of potential Chinese smartphone users.

At the last count, the number had reached 80, most of which are no household names; only Lenovo, Xiaomi and Huawei have managed to cross that east-west chasm. Now, a newcomer, Doogee, aims to challenge the status quo with a raft of new smartphones.

I have to admit that when I wrote the April Fools piece Bill Gates loves his new iPhone 5s, can now beat Bono at Candy Crush a few years ago, I did not expect the former Microsoft CEO to actually abandon Windows Phone for a rival platform. But, it happened -- though I was only half right.

Bill Gates did not switch to the iPhone (although the new iPhone line is pretty cool), going with an Android smartphone "with a lot of Microsoft software" instead. This is huge, if you think about it, as Gates basically acknowledged that Windows 10 Mobile just isn't good enough for him.

Employees given one of the most popular choices of Android smartphones can now expect their devices to arrive preconfigured, meaning they can use them out of the box without the typical tedious -- albeit necessary -- setup process.

A new tool rolled out by Google, called zero-touch enrolment, aims to result in less work for both administrators and end-users. Admins will be sure all corporate policies are always in place, and end users only need to log in to start using their new smartphone.

If taking great photos and videos is important to you, then the iPhone 8 Plus is the best smartphone that you can get right now. That's according to camera testing site DxOMark, which says that Apple's new flagship range tops its charts in nearly every category, featuring "outstanding image quality."

The iPhone 8 Plus comes ahead of every other smartphone in DxOMark's mobile rankings, including the smaller iPhone 8 which takes second place. It basically wipes the floor with every other rival flagship, including the well-received Google Pixel and HTC U11.

Security researchers from Adguard have issued a warning that the popular GO Keyboard app is spying on users. Produced by Chinese developers GOMO Dev Team, GO Keyboard was found to be transmitting personal information about users back to remote servers, as well as "using a prohibited technique to download dangerous executable code."

Adguard made the discovery while conducting research into the traffic consumption and unwanted behavior of various Android keyboards. The AdGuard for Android app makes it possible to see exactly what traffic an app is generating, and it showed that GO Keyboard was making worrying connections, making use of trackers, and sharing personal information.

The aesthetics of the new Control Center in iOS 11 has been the source of amusement, debate and disgust in varying measures. But putting the look to one side for a moment, people upgrading to iOS 11 have been disappointed to discover that the toggles for Bluetooth and Wi-Fi in the Control Center don't actually turn off Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

For reasons best known to Apple, the toggles disconnect from wireless networks and Bluetooth devices, but the two radios will remain enabled. While the change of functionality is covered in Apple's support documentation, it's not something that is obvious to users. It's hugely unintuitive, drains battery life and, according to security researchers, could leave iOS devices open to attack.

The Librem 5 smartphone by Purism has a long and difficult road ahead of it. Competing against the likes of Apple and Google on the mobile market has proven to be a death sentence for many platforms -- including Microsoft with its failed Windows 10 Mobile. With that said, I am rooting for Purism and its Pure OS, as the world would benefit from a device that uses Linux and focuses on both privacy and security. Such an alternative to iPhone and Android would be a breath of fresh air.

Luckily, Purism has found itself a new partner on this project -- one of the most important organizations in the Linux community -- The GNOME Foundation. Yes, the maker of the absolute best desktop environment is offering to assist with the Librem 5 -- if it is successfully crowdfunded, that is. To date, it is only about 33-percent funded, although there is still more than a month to go.

Adblock Plus is about more than just its eponymous software -- the company also produces Adblock Browser. Now version 2.0 of the secure, private mobile web browser has been released for iOS and it introduces a wealth of new features.

Key among these new features is Ghost Mode which makes it easy to slip into anonymous web browsing mode whenever privacy is of the utmost importance. As the name of the browser implies, there is also an integrated ad-blocker, but it does not end there -- this is an update that the company has been working on for more than a year.

If you have a Samsung Galaxy S8 or Galaxy S8+ you may well have a strong opinion about the dedicated Bixby button. For some people, one-click access to Samsung's digital assistant, Bixby, is a real boon -- for others it's just a pain in the butt.

The positioning of the button is such that it is incredibly easy to hit it by mistake, such as when you try to press the volume down button. With a new update Samsung is finally making it possible to disable the button.

As had been widely expected, Google has unveiled its new mobile payment service for India. Called Tez, the service is Google's first step into digital payments in Asia.

Tez makes it possible for users to link their bank accounts to the app and then use their phones to make in-person payments and transfers. Support for the government-backed UPI (Unified Payments Interface) means the service is compatible with a number of major banks. At the moment, Tez is limited to India, but there appear to be plans to spread it further.