SHAFAQNA

Shafaqna - We have all had it happen, from the toilet drop disaster to phone in the bathtub moment. It can be an upsetting experience, but if you wet your phone, all is not lost.

Act quickly and you can often save your phone from certain destruction.

It's also possible to cut your losses - a wet phone needn't be a write-off, and handsets can often be repaired, particularly if you act quickly

Just before we get started, a caveat: none of this is guaranteed to stop your phone from breaking.
There are times when things just get too wet. But if you're lucky, these tips will help.

Take the battery out immediately

So you have soaked your phone. The first thing you absolutely must do is yank the battery out of it. Water and powered on electronics don’t mix, as you would expect. Stopping any current running through the internals of your phone can save it from permanent damage.

If you can’t take the battery out, then the alternative is to shut the phone down. iPhone users take heed here, you must shut the handset down as fast as you can.

Worth noting though, is that Apple has built a security device into its phones which will show if you have got it wet -so you won’t be able to claim under warranty.

Get it wet

Next comes the hardest part: you may need to get your phone wet again - depending on what you've dunked it in. Letting a handset dry out after a drop in the likes of saltwater and Coke can cause chemicals in liquids to crystallise later down the line, causing the phone to break.

To combat this, get hold of some distilled water and give the phone a thorough wash. This way if you do manage to dry things out, the phone will stay fixed permanently. Obviously if your handset is only slightly wet, don’t risk washing it out completely. This is a fix for full submersion only, and only in fluids such as soft drinks.

Get rid of the excess

Next up, you need to make sure you have the majority of the standing water free from out of the device. Don’t start drying anything properly yet, just make sure you have as many of the droplets of water gone as possible. Make sure the internals have no visible water blobs on board.

To do this, dismantle the phone as far as you can and then shake off any excess water. Take the SIM card and the microSD card out (if you have one) and make sure no big drops of water are stuck anywhere else.

Start the drying process

This is the part that can save your phone, so it’s vital you do it right. The key here is patience, resisting the urge to switch your handset back on until you are absolutely positive that it is dry.

What you will need is some form of desiccant or drying material to put alongside your phone, as well as a sealable plastic bag. Silica gel sachets and a sandwich bag will work, or alternatively you can use uncooked rice.

Place the phone in the bag and leave it for at least 48 hours, long enough for condensation to form on the bag and the silica gel or rice to draw whatever moisture is left out of the phone.  If you can see water droplets or condensation on the screen, we’re afraid things just haven’t worked out.

Switch your phone on and if it starts up, then you are in luck. We suggest giving it a full charge and letting it drain a the battery down to zero again, just to be sure everything is back in full working order.

Call the insurer

What if your drying efforts have failed? The best you can do now is to call your insurer, provided you have one. Get all your receipts, boxes and accessories in order and prepare to ship the phone out for repairs.

Not all insurers will cover for things like water damage, but most will. It should fall under the accidental damage section of your insurance policy. You should be able to find exact details of cover in the documents the insurance company sent you.

A few weeks worth of repairs and your handset should be back with you, ready to browse the web and send text messages all over again.


Send it off for repairs

If you aren’t insured, then you will need to post the handset off for repairs. Your insurer might also suggest you do this. If you are covered, we suggest getting the phone professionally repaired after water damage, just because problems can occur months down the line if circuits have been damaged.

Repair costs will vary depending on the level of damage done. A proper soaking will often result in the whole phone being written off, although you might get away with just a screen repair, setting you back about £80. In the end, if you are the type who regularly soaks mobiles, then stumping up for proper handset insurance or a water resistant phone, like Sony’s new Xperia Z, would be money well spent.

Source: Recombu

www.shafaqna.com

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) – Most Canadian carriers went live with Samsung Galaxy S 4 pre-registrations yesterday, which is a good indication that the official release date is imminent. Virgin Mobile was one of the carriers and they’ve also listed a contest were members can win a GS4. Virgin notes in the terms and conditions that “There is a total of one (1) prize available to be won. The prize consists of one (1) Samsung Galaxy S 4 smartphone (model i337M) from Virgin Mobile. Approximate value of the prize is: $699.99.”

It looks like we Canadians will be getting model number SGH-I337M. In addition, the outright price falls in line with previous flagship Galaxy device launches. The Galaxy S III ranged by carrier from $600 – $700. So prepare your pocket book.-www.shafaqna.com/English

Source: Mobilesyrup

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) – Here’s yet another iPhone 5S rumor. Earlier today we reported on another one which claimed that Apple is going to start production of the iPhone 5S this quarter. It also added that the smartphone is likely to be released in the summer. This particular rumor coincides with that, as it suggests that the iPhone 5S will be available on China Mobile in July. While being available from more than 240 carriers in 100 countries around the globle, the iPhone has never been available from China Mobile, which happens to be the largest mobile carrier in the entire world. Regardless of that, the network still have over 15 million iPhone users, who are using unlocked devices.

This particular rumor also contradicts the previous one. The latter claimed Apple will be releasing a low cost iPhone in the second half of this year, whereas the former claims that Apple has no such plans and that it will continue to sell iPhone 4 when it releases iPhone 5S. There’s a lot of uncertainty these days in the news surrounding Apple’s upcoming smartphone(s), thankfully we’re not that far off from Summer 2013.-www.shafaqna.com/English

Source: Ubergizmo

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) -- Whenever a phone is switched on, its connection to the network means its position and movement can be plotted.

This data is given anonymously to third parties, both to drive services for the user and to target advertisements.

But a study in Scientific Reports warns that human mobility patterns are so predictable it is possible to identify a user from only four data points.

The growing ubiquity of mobile phones and smartphone applications has ushered in an era in which tremendous amounts of user data have become available to the companies that operate and distribute them - sometimes released publicly as "anonymised" or aggregated data sets.

These data are of extraordinary value to advertisers and service providers, but also for example to those who plan shopping centres, allocate emergency services, and a new generation of social scientists.

Yet the spread and development of "location services" has outpaced the development of a clear understanding of how location data impact users' privacy and anonymity.

For example, sat-nav manufacturers have long been using location data from both mobile phones and sat-navs themselves to improve traffic reporting, by calculating how fast users are moving on a given stretch of road.

The data used in such calculations are "anonymised" - no actual mobile numbers or personal details are associated with the data.

But there are some glaring examples of how nominally anonymous data can be linked back to individuals, the most striking of which occurred with a tranche of data deliberately released by AOL in 2006, outlining 20 million anonymised web searches.

Trace amounts

Recent work has increasingly shown that humans' patterns of movement, however random and unpredictable they seem to be, are actually very limited in scope and can in fact act as a kind of fingerprint for who is doing the moving.

The new work details just how "low-resolution" these location data can be and still act as a unique identifier of individuals.

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Catholic University of Louvain studied 15 months' worth of anonymised mobile phone records for 1.5 million individuals.

They found from the "mobility traces" - the evident paths of each mobile phone - that only four locations and times were enough to identify a particular user.

"In the 1930s, it was shown that you need 12 points to uniquely identify and characterise a fingerprint," said the study's lead author Yves-Alexandre de Montjoye of MIT.

"What we did here is the exact same thing but with mobility traces. The way we move and the behaviour is so unique that four points are enough to identify 95% of people," he told BBC News.

"We think this data is more available than people think. When you think about, for instance wi-fi or any application you start on your phone, we call up the same kind of mobility data.

"When you share information, you look around you and feel like there are lots of people around - in the shopping centre or a tourist place - so you feel this isn't sensitive information."

Privacy formula

The team went on to quantify how "high-resolution" the data need to be - the precision to which a location is known - in order to more fully guarantee privacy.

Co-author Cesar Hidalgo said that the data follow a natural mathematical pattern that could be used as an analytical guide as more location services and high-resolution data become available.

"The idea here is that there is a natural trade-off between the resolution at which you are capturing this information and anonymity, and that this trade-off is just by virtue of resolution and the uniqueness of the pattern," he told BBC News.

"This is really fundamental in the sense that now we're operating at high resolution, the trade-off is how useful the data are and if the data can be anonymised at all. A traffic forecasting service wouldn't work if you had the data within a day; you need that within an hour, within minutes."

Dr Hidalgo notes that additional information would still be needed to connect a mobility trace to an individual, but that users freely give away some of that information through geo-located tweets, location "check-ins" with applications such as Foursquare and so on.

But the authors say their purpose is to provide a mathematical link - a formula applicable to all mobility data - that quantifies the anonymity/utility trade-off, and hope that the work sparks debate about the relative merits of this "Big Data" and individual privacy.

Sam Smith of Privacy International said: "Our mobile phones report location and contextual data to multiple organisations with varying privacy policies."

"Any benefits we receive from such services are far outweighed by the threat that these trends pose to our privacy, and although we are told that we have a choice about how much information we give over, in reality individuals have no choice whatsoever," he told BBC News.

"Science and technology constantly make it harder to live in a world where privacy is protected by governments, respected by corporations and cherished by individuals - cultural norms lag behind progress."

But Mr de Montjoye stressed that there is far more to location data than just privacy concerns.

"We really don't think that we should stop collecting or using this data - there's way too much to gain for all of us - companies, scientists, and users," he said.

"We've really tried hard to not frame this as a 'Big Brother' situation, as 'we know everything about you'. But we show that even if there's no name or email address it can still be personal data, so we need it to be treated accordingly."

www.shafaqna.com/English

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) – Motorola Mobility's study of 9,500 global consumers found that a majority of respondents who view video programming in the bedroom use their smartphones and tablets versus broadcast TV.

Motorola's Media Engagement Barometer looks at the video consumption habits of 9,500 consumers across 17 countries.

What are wired people around the world doing in the living room and bedroom? Consuming content on their mobile devices, according to Motorola Mobility's Fourth Annual Media Engagement Barometer. Consumers globally are watching 25 hours of TV and film programming per week on average, up from 15 hours in 2011.

Fifty percent of respondents said they watch programming on their TVs in the living room, while 40 percent use their smartphones or  tablets instead, the study found. The Motorola Mobility (owned by Google) survey of 9,500 consumers in 17 countries found that among the 36 percent of respondents who watch video programming in the bedroom, 46 percent view it on a smartphone, 41 percent on a tablet, and 36 percent on broadcast TV. Moreover, 9 percent of tablet owners and 16 percent of smartphone owners are consuming content in the bathroom, according to the study.

More than 50 percent of those surveyed have downloaded or stored a TV program or film on a mobile device.

An expected finding is that consumers want more flexibility across a variety of devices in how they view programming. Among those surveyed, 76 percent indicated that they want the capability to move video content between devices automatically.

Skipping ads is a major reason people choose to record programming. According to the study, 68 percent globally and 75 percent in the U.S. indicated that they record broadcast TV to skip ads. This trend presents an ongoing challenge to the TV networks.

Fox, CBS (the parent company of CNET), NBC (Comcast), and ABC (Disney) have filed separate suits against Dish Network over the AutoHop feature in its DVR. The networks maintain that the ad-skipping feature will destroy the advertiser-supported ecosystem and that Dish doesn't have the right to tamper with advertising from broadcast replays for its economic and commercial advantage. Dish claims that the AutoHop feature doesn't infringe on copyright. The technology doesn't alter the broadcast signal and the ads are not deleted from the recording.

Time-shifted TV accounted for 29 percent of weekly viewing in Motorola's study. While, on average, DVR owners watch more TV than those who watch live TV, nearly a third of recorded content is never watched. Among U.S. people surveyed, 41 percent of recorded content is never viewed. Even so, driven by the flood of quality programming across broadcast and cable networks, TV viewing rose from 10 hours in 2011 to 19 hours per week. Movie consumption rose from 5 to 6 hours per week. The U.S. topped the list of countries in the amount of programming it watches, with 23 hours of TV and 6 hours of movies consumed weekly.

Among the other findings:

77 percent of those surveyed indicated they record programming because of conflicts with live programming they want to watch.

72 percent said they record to store the full series of a program.

68 percent have deleted content because they have run out of storage room on their devices.

50 percent of those surveyed don't engage in social media activities while watching programs. However, 60 percent of 16- to 24-year-old respondents follow social conversations while viewing programming.

-www.shafaqna.com/English

Source: CNET

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) – Despite what your feelings may be about Firefox OS, various OEMs and carriers are clearly content with having more options to explore. The latest outfit appears to be Sony's Mobile entity, which, earlier today, announced it had reached a multi-year deal with Telefónica that will "explore the development" of a device running Mozilla's novel operating system. What's more, Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Head of Products Business Group, Bob Ishida, says Sony Mobile engineers are already working on a project with the new mobile OS on the block, adding that the eventual goal is to "bring a product to market in 2014." Now, whether we'll see higher-end slabs than some of the ones we've experienced thus far, well, dear readers, that remains to be seen.

Sony Mobile and Telefónica reinforce partnership with multi-year commercial and technical collaboration

Telefonica to range Sony Mobile's 2013 Xperia portfolio including Xperia™ Z and Xperia™ Tablet Z

Telefónica establishes technical partnership with Sony Mobile to leverage opportunities with the new Firefox OS open source platform

25th February 2013, Barcelona, Spain - Telefónica and Sony Mobile Communications ("Sony Mobile") today reinforced the strength of their commercial partnership in a multi-year agreement that confirms the operator's ranging support for Sony Mobile's 2013 Xperia™ Android device portfolio, as well as laying out a joint technical collaboration to explore the development of a handset running Mozilla's Firefox OS open source mobile platform.

Sony Mobile and Telefónica are long-term partners and Sony Mobile has in the past year steadily grown its portfolio of premium Android-based smartphones available on the Telefónica network, including the Xperia™ T - aka 'The Bond phone' and now the acclaimed Xperia™ Z smartphone and Xperia™ Tablet Z. Under the terms of the agreement, Telefónica and Sony Mobile will further strengthen their partnership and investigate emerging technologies such as the Firefox OS platform to extend Sony's premium product portfolio to a wider customer base.

"At Sony Mobile we continue to evaluate innovative technologies that can help deliver the premium user experiences that Sony's consumers expect," said Bob Ishida, Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Head of Products Business Group, Sony Mobile Communications. "Our engineers are now working with Firefox OS Mobile and HTML5, evolving technologies which show great potential. In addition, we continue to work with our operator partners, including Telefónica, on a development project with an ambition to bring a product to market in 2014."

"Sony's Xperia Z and Xperia Tablet Z are stunning devices that really raise the bar when it comes to the premium smartphone and tablet segment- and we're delighted to be partnering to bring these to market across a number of our global channels," commented Marieta del Rivero, Group Devices Director, Telefónica. "As well as the great opportunity we have in 2013, our further collaboration around a possible device on the Firefox OS mobile platform will create the opportunity to reach new segments of the market, allowing us to provide an even wider choice of premium Sony device offerings for our customers."

Firefox OS marks a significant milestone for the industry, enabling for the first time devices to be manufactured to totally open web standards. It will provide customers with a rich, open and dynamic smartphone experience.-www.shfaqna.com/English

Source: Engadget

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) – Samsung and Visa have just signed a Global Alliance Agreement to Accelerate Mobile (NFC) Payments. Last Year, Visa and Samsung tested the mobile payment system during Olympics 2012 and it looks like the Olympics trial went well. Samsung and Visa want to go all global with their new mobile payment system. Visa has convinced Samsung to pre-load the payWave app onto every future NFC-Enabled Samsung Smartphone. The first Samsung smartphone to feature the new payWave app and the mobile payment system could be the Galaxy S IV, launching on March 14th.

Press Release

FOSTER CITY, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Feb. 25, 2013– Visa and Samsung today announced a global alliance that combines Visa’s expertise in payments with Samsung’s leadership in mobile device technology – an alliance that has the potential to significantly accelerate the availability of mobile payments globally.

According to the agreement, financial institutions that are planning to launch mobile payment programs will be able to use the Visa Mobile Provisioning Service1 to securely download payment account information to NFC-enabled Samsung devices. In addition, Samsung has agreed to load the Visa payWave applet onto its mobile devices featuring NFC technology. Visa payWave is Visa’s mobile payment applet that enables consumers to make “wave and pay” contactless payments using mobile devices.

“Samsung devices enabled with Visa payment functionality will no doubt be a powerful product offering – especially in markets where paying with a mobile device is becoming commonplace,” said Jim McCarthy, global head of product, Visa Inc. “However, the key to making mobile payments broadly available all over the world is to offer financial institutions a secure way to provision millions of smartphones with payment account information – and that is exactly what Visa and Samsung are ready to deliver.”

“Samsung has been a pioneer in NFC devices and is again leading the way in enabling NFC-based mobile payments. The partnership with Visa represents a step towards a global mobile payment platform,” said Dr. Won-Pyo Hong, President and Head of Media Solution Center, Samsung Electronics. “We believe that we have a strong value proposition for financial institutions that will ultimately allow consumer choice in NFC payments.”

Near Field Communication (NFC) technology is the global communication standard that enables mobile devices to securely communicate with a payment terminal. ABI Research forecasts that a total of 1.95 billion NFC-enabled devices will ship in 20172. The Visa Samsung global alliance is a first of its kind between a leading NFC handset manufacturer and payment network that is paving the way for the implementation of large scale mobile payment programs. The initial areas of engagement that the two companies have agreed to include:

Global Strategic Alliance

Visa and Samsung have agreed to work together to enable the next generation of Samsung mobile devices with Visa payment technology, and to partner with financial institutions to accelerate the availability of mobile payment solutions globally.

Samsung to Connect to Visa’s Mobile Provisioning Service

In order to enable financial institutions to launch large scale mobile (NFC) payment programs, Samsung will offer banks the ability to load payment account information over-the-air to a secure chip embedded in Samsung devices, using Visa’s Mobile Provisioning Service3 which is linked to Samsung KMS (Key Management System) – a service that creates secure data storage domains for issuers.

Samsung Awarded Global Visa payWave License

The Visa payWave mobile applet will be preloaded onto selected next-generation Samsung mobile devices featuring NFC technology and an embedded secure element. Off the shelf, these devices are ready to be personalized with Visa payment account information – a simple step that consumers will be able to initiate using a mobile payment application provided by their financial institution.

At Mobile World Congress 2013 in Barcelona, February 25-28, Visa will demonstrate Visa payWave for mobile and its Mobile Provisioning Service that can be used by financial institutions to securely load payment account information to NFC-enabled Samsung mobile devices. For more information, visit Visa at Mobile World Congress, Hall 6, Stand 6E40.

About Visa Inc.

Visa is a global payments technology company that connects consumers, businesses, financial institutions and governments in more than 200 countries and territories to fast, secure and reliable electronic payments. We operate one of the world’s most advanced processing networks—VisaNet—that is capable of handling more than 24,000 transaction messages a second, with fraud protection for consumers and assured payment for merchants. Visa is not a bank and does not issue cards, extend credit or set rates and fees for consumers. Visa’s innovations, however, enable its financial institution customers to offer consumers more choices: pay now with debit, ahead of time with prepaid or later with credit products. For more information, visit corporate.visa.com.

About Visa Europe

Visa Europe is a payments technology business owned and operated by member banks and other payment service providers from 36 countries across Europe. Visa Europe works at the forefront of technology to create the services and infrastructure which enable millions of European consumers, businesses and governments to make electronic payments. Its members are responsible for issuing cards, signing up retailers and deciding cardholder and retailer fees. As a dedicated European payment system Visa Europe is able to respond quickly to the specific market needs of European banks and their customers – cardholders and retailers – and to meet the European Commission’s objective to create a true internal market for payments. For more information, please visit www.visaeurope.com

About Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. is a global leader in technology, opening new possibilities for people everywhere. Through relentless innovation and discovery, we are transforming the worlds of televisions, smartphones, personal computers, printers, cameras, home appliances, LTE systems, medical devices, semiconductors and LED solutions. We employ 236,000 people across 79 countries with annual sales exceeding KRW 201 trillion. To discover more, please visit www.samsung.com.-www.shfaqna.com/English

Source: Sammobile

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) –Make way for one more player in the European mobile payments space, and a big one at that. Today, the online payments giant PayPal announced that from this summer it will be rolling out PayPal Here in the UK, its first foray into the European market, equipped with a new piece of hardware to accomodate the chip-based cards prevalent in this part of the world.

PayPal has not set a definite launch date or revealed pricing for the service, but the company tells me it will be “competitive” with existing offers from rivals. The standard fee among them right now for transactions is 2.75%, and two have recently launched chip readers costing €49 ($65).

PayPal says that it picked the UK for its first stab at mobile payments in Europe because, with 18 million

customers (out of 123 million worldwide), the UK is the company’s second-largest market outside of the U.S. And it also has one of the highest smartphone penetrations in Europe — currently at around 61%, according to Kantar Worldpanel Comtech. Establishing PayPal Here in the UK will be used as a lever for further expansion into the rest of Europe. “We are launching Here this summer but will expand to other markets as we go forward,” noted Cameron McLean, MD of PayPal in the UK, in an interview with TechCrunch.

It also means that David Marcus, the president of PayPal, has a chance to come full circle and finally bring PayPal’s mobile payment service to his own home market. (Coming from France, Marcus founded and then sold his mobile carrier billing startup Zong to PayPal, first becoming head of mobile and then eventually president of the whole operation.)

“PayPal Here has been a big hit since its launch last year, and I’m thrilled that we’re bringing a brand new version that’s designed for Europe and beyond,” Marcus said in a statement. PayPal would not say how much revenue it has generated from PayPal Here in the U.S. but it is one of many different services that it offers to increase touchpoints with businesses and their customers. The company says that in 2012 it processed some $145 million in payments overall, across both mobile and web.

All of eBay-owned PayPal’s efforts up to now have been centered around a triangular dongle that plugs into an iPhone or Android device to read the magnetic strip on the back of a card — similar to the square-shaped dongle produced by its big U.S. rival Square (which has yet to enter Europe). Europe will see a different approach from PayPal.

To accomodate the chip-based cards used in Europe, as well as the requirements of companies like Visa in Europe, PayPal will be producing a separate chip-and-pin device that will let customers insert a card and enter a PIN number to verify their identity. This is also the direction that all of the other Square-like European mobile payments companies have had to go as well. One of these, iZettle, introduced its chip-and-PIN reader only yesterday, no doubt to get a little PR jump on PayPal Here (and to get around some of the problems that it ran into with Visa over the use of its dongle).

It may also be the case that while the U.S. still has mag stripes for now, companies like Visa are working to bring the technology to the U.S., so PayPal Here’s European card reader may end up having more currency beyond the Old World.

PayPal joins a number of European-based startups, such as the American Express-backed iZettle; Samwer/Rocket Internet’s Payleven; SumUp and mPowa; as well as U.S. rival Intuit Pay, to tackle the large base of small and medium-sized businesses in the region that have yet to accept card payments because bank fees on traditional card services have been too high in the past.

The UK becomes PayPal’s fifth market out side of the U.S., where it first launched in March 2012. PayPal here is also available in Canada, Australia, Hong Kong, and Japan — the last of which it operates in a JV with Softbank.

The chip-and-pin card reader will work using Bluetooth connectivity to pair with a merchant’s smartphone to read and then process the card number and PIN code. Merchants will then use apps on their smartphones to both complete the transaction as well as generate receipts. McLean tells me the reader will also be used for more than just card transactions. It will also let merchants log cash and check payments, as well as make PayPal payments.

Here’s a short video of one of the early case studies of a small business owner — a market trader selling ice cream at the foody-famous Borough Market in London

PAYPAL MAKES IT SIMPLER FOR CASH-BASED BUSINESSES TO RECEIVE DIGITAL PAYMENTS WITH NEW CHIP & PIN DEVICE

- NEW VERSION OF SUCCESSFUL GLOBAL PAYMENT SOLUTION PAYPAL HERE

– AVAILABLE IN THE UK, SUMMER 2013

· PayPal’s pocket-sized Chip & PIN solution will make it easier for businesses to take secure card payments face to face, anytime, anywhere

· Businesses need never again turn away sales because the customer has no cash, and no more lines to deposit funds at the banks

London, 22 February 2013 – PayPal, the company that has been leading innovation in payments for 15 years, has unveiled a breakthrough Chip & PIN version of its award winning global payment solution for businesses, PayPal Here.

The pocket-size handheld device is a game-changer for small businesses. It will enable them to accept credit and debit cards and PayPal payments easily and efficiently wherever they do business – increasing potential sales.

Aimed especially for businesses that have traditionally relied on cash or cheques, the Chip & PIN version of PayPal Here has been designed for use in countries where credit cards rely on Chip and PIN technology, rather than swiping a card, for transactions.

It will be available to select UK businesses over the coming months before it fully launches in the UK this summer. The Chip & PIN version will be available in other relevant markets after the UK launch.

PayPal Here is unique: a complete payment solution that allows any business to simply and securely accept PayPal, credit & debit card payments, log cash and cheques, even send invoices & receipts so they never miss a sale. There’s no contract or ongoing fees, just the initial competitive purchase price and a small fee for each transaction.

Businessmen and women can pair the device with their smartphone to accept secure payments anytime, anywhere they’re trading, whether at a market stall, shop, restaurants, taxi or even in a customer’s home.

David Marcus, President of PayPal, said: “PayPal Here has been a big hit since its launch last year, and I’m thrilled that we’re bringing a brand new version that’s designed for Europe and beyond. We aimed to create game-changing device for businesses in the UK and other nations where Chip & PIN payments are standard. The result is a beautiful device that offers a strong and secure solution for businesses and, as importantly, their customers. Small businesses are the heart of economies worldwide and we are thrilled to launch this product to help them succeed.

“At PayPal, we spend a huge amount of time talking and listening to small businesses. They are the core of PayPal’s business and they’ve told us that they want a simple, secure way to take card payments anytime and anywhere they trade. We’ve used that feedback to create what we think is the best payment device ever created. It’s a great example of our vision for PayPal: a wonderful customer experience from the moment the PayPal Here app is downloaded to taking the device out of the box and accepting a first payment. We’ve even included a ‘click to call us’ button in the app so our customer service team can be reached in one click just in case help is needed.”

Cameron McLean, managing director of PayPal UK, said, “Cash and cheques have served us all well over the years, but businesses that rely on them risk missing valuable sales. PayPal Here will let them offer their customers extra ways to pay, while saving them the hassle of taking cash and cheques to the bank. The arrival of PayPal Here in Britain is the latest example of how we’re helping UK businesses make the most of connected commerce: the new opportunities created by the merger of the online world and the high street.”

Emma Jones, Founder of Enterprise Nation, said, “One of the challenges small businesses in the UK face is getting paid. Cash and cheques seem easy, but soon people start to realise the lack of security, the inconvenience for customers and the Friday afternoon wait at the bank to deposit your money. Equally, many people are put off from signing up with a traditional card processing company because of the high fees, long-term contract commitments and bulky handsets. PayPal Here promises to change all that, by offering start-ups and established businesses a smarter way to get paid, and helping British business to grow in the way that PayPal has already done for many small businesses here and around the world.”

Mark Thomas from Greedy Goat ice cream, a PayPal Here UK launch partner that trades at London’s Borough Market, commented, “Cash is king in the market, but people run out of cash very quickly, and we often lose sales because customers can’t face the long weekend wait at the ATM. PayPal Here is the perfect solution for us, as it gives our customers the chance to pay by card, backed by the reassurance of the PayPal name on the machine. It means more people will enjoy our goats’ milk ice cream this year, which is great for our business.”

PayPal handled $145 billion in payments in 2012 and has more than 123 million active accounts, 18 million in the UK alone.

UK businesses who wish to register interest in PayPal Here can do so at http://www.paypal.co.uk/here.-www.shfaqna.com/English

Source: Techcrunch

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) – In addition to an 8-inch Galaxy Note tablet, Samsung will likely launch the next generation of its Galaxy Tab series at Mobile World Congress.

Rumours have been circulating that the Korean company is testing 8- and 10.1-inch variations of the new tablet, aimed at both entry- and high-level markets. GLBenchmark, a place where new devices hide in plain sight, has an entry for a Samsung product with a model number of GT-P3200, also known by the codename Santos.

SamMobile recently speculated that Santos was the name used internally by Samsung to refer to the entire Galaxy Tab 3 family, which breaks down into 8-inch and 10.1-inch versions, the latter coming in at two price points. In addition to a modestly-priced version of the Galaxy Tab 3 10.1, Samsung is expected to reveal a Galaxy Tab 3 10.1 Plus with the same display resolution as the Nexus 10, 2560×1600 pixels.

Going back to the leaked benchmark, the GT-P3200 looks to align with the 8-inch Galaxy Tab 3 (no more 7-inch model, apparently — even tablets are going up in size), with a 1280×800 pixel display, a 1.5Ghz CPU of unknown cores, running Android 4.2.1 Jelly Bean. No other specs are available, but we’ll sure to learn more in the coming weeks.-www.shfaqna.com/English

Source: Mobilesyrup

SHAFAQNA (Shia International News Association) -- Google just offered up a solution to one of the bigger complaints with mobile ads -- the fat finger problem.

The search giant implemented a new feature Thursday called "confirmed clicks" for all in-app banner ads on smartphones in an effort to crack down on the number of accidental clicks on mobile.

Starting today, when users tap on the outer edge of one of these mobile ads, a tab will appear at the bottom 
of the screen prompting them to "Visit Site." Users will need to tap on this tab to verify that they do want to be re-directed to a new site by the ad.

"We find that most accidental clicks on in-app image ads happen at the outer edge of the ad unit, likely when you’re trying to click or scroll to nearby content," Allen Huang, Google's product manager for mobile display ads, wrote in a blog post announcing the change. "Now if you click on the outer border of the ad, we’ll prompt you to verify that you actually meant to click on the ad to learn more."

Many analysts and advertisers have suggested that mobile click-through rates are exaggerated by the fact that smartphone screens are smaller and therefore make it more likely users will accidentally tap on an ad. By implementing a kind of two-step verification process for mobile ads, Google may be able to improve the user experience and alleviate the concerns of advertisers.

"As devices continue to converge there will be new challenges in the fight against what many have called the ‘fat finger’ problem," Huang wrote. "But implementing confirmed clicks is an important step that we think will benefit users, advertisers, publishers, and the mobile ecosystem overall, and we’ll continue to look for ways to improve mobile ads for everyone."

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