An anonymous reader sends this excerpt from MIT's Technology Review: A new feature being added to the LTE protocol that smartphones use to communicate with cellular towers will make it possible to bypass those towers altogether. Phones will be able to "talk" directly to other mobile devices and to beacons located in shops and other businesses. Known as LTE Direct, the wireless technology has a range of up to 500 meters, far more than either Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. It is included in update to the LTE standard slated for approval this year, and devices capable of LTE Direct could appear as soon as late 2015. ... Researchers are, for example, testing LTE Direct as a way to allow smartphones to automatically discover nearby people, businesses, and other information.

Jaxoreth writes "The Kodak Easyshare Wireless Digital Picture Frame displays images via a per-frame RSS feed hosted by FrameChannel. Each frame's URL is identical except for a parameter matching its particular MAC address, enabling public browsing of users' feeds. And worse, if you reach the feed of a not-yet-activated frame, it gives you the code to activate it, allowing you to preload it with whatever content you choose."

FullBandwidth writes "Paper-thin batteries that can be printed onto greeting cards or other flexible substrates have been demonstrated at Fraunhofer Research Institution for Electronic Nano Systems in Germany. The batteries have a relatively short life span, as the anode and cathode materials dissipate over time. However, they contain no hazardous materials."

Toe, The writes "Apple's 358-page patent application for their iPhone interface entitled Touch screen device, method, and graphical user interface for determining commands by applying heuristics has been approved after more than two years of review by the US Patent Office. Apple's claims include: 'A computer-implemented method for use in conjunction with a computing device with a touch screen display comprises: detecting one or more finger contacts with the touch screen display, applying one or more heuristics to the one or more finger contacts to determine a command for the device, and processing the command. The one or more heuristics comprise: a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command, a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a two-dimensional screen translation command, and a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a command to transition from displaying a respective item in a set of items to displaying a next item in the set of items.' As Apple seems eager to defend their intellectual property, what will this mean to other touch developers?"

Sub Zero 992 writes "Heise Security (article in German) is reporting that at this year's Chaos Communications Congress (25C3) researchers in Europe's dedected.org group have published an article (PDF) showing, using a PC-Card costing only EUR 23, how to eavesdrop on DECT transmissions. There are hundreds of millions of terminals, ranging from telephones, to electronic payment terminals, to door openers, using the DECT standard." So far, the Heise article's German only, but I suspect will show up soon in English translation. Update: 12/30 21:27 GMT by T : Reader Juha-Matti Laurio writes with the story in English. Thanks!