Year: <span>2004</span>
Year: 2004

Year: 2004

Prepaid Phones Going, Going, Gone?

Will prepaid phones pay the price for allegedly rising crime rates in Japan? NTT DoCoMo president Masao Nakamura spoke of discontinuing prepaid phone services at a recent press conference and others are calling for an outright ban. Japan’s close (some would say too close) private/public-sector interaction seemed to shadow his statement that the company needed to act considering the growing number of fraud cases using prepaid handsets. It’s only coincidence, we’re sure, that one of DoCoMo’s foreign competitors stands to lose big from shutting down prepaid. And last week, a European business organization pointed out just how wacky a ban would be.

Dilithium Networks Reaches 80% Market Share in 3G Video Telephony Test Market

Dilithium Networks, a leading provider of wireless multimedia solutions, announced today that NEC, one of the largest 3G handset vendors has purchased Dilithium Network Analyzer, further confirming our leading position in the 3G video telephony test market. Dilithium Networks estimates that 80% of 3G Mobile operators, network equipment vendors, and handset manufacturers use Dilithium Networks Analyzer (DNA) to perform 3G-324M protocol compliance, interoperability testing and QoS measurements of mobile networks.

Virus Protection For 3G Phones

McAfee is offering subscribers to Japan’s mobile carrier, NTT DoCoMo, a mobile content scanning technology designed to provide protection against future mobile threats. McAfee VirusScan Content Scanning technology, the industry’s first mobile virus scanning solution, was jointly developed with NTT DoCoMo and is offered as a built-in service on the new FOMA 901i-series 3G mobile phones.

More Linux 3G Phones Coming

NEC and Panasonic have developed three Linux-powered 3G mobile phones to be introduced in Japan in the coming months — NEC’s N900iL, NEC’s N901iC, and Panasonic’s P901i. Of the three, only NEC’s N900iL [see WWJ’s video] is currently shipping. The N900iL is a dual-network 3G/VoIP handset that works as a 3G mobile phone (using DoCoMo’s W-CDMA/FOMA technologies), VoIP terminal, or both simultaneously.

Symbian Hit with Skulls Trojan

F-Secure just posted they’ve had “some isolated reports of users who’ve been hit by the new Skulls trojan on their phones.” It has been distributed on some Symbian shareware download sites as “Extended Theme Manager” by “Tee-222”. If you see it, don’t install it on your phone. According to the article “the most obvious symptom of the trojan is that the typical programs on the phone won’t work any more, and that their icons get replaced with a picture of a skull.”

Mobile Monday Rocks!!!

Mobile Monday Rocks!!!Tokyo’s best and brightest mobilistas gathered for Mobile Monday Tokyo in October, and WWJ was shooting! MoMo is a monthly networking event designed to… well, to get everyone together! What a blast! Folks were there from carriers, handset makers, technology vendors, application developers, and content providers on both the foreign and Japanese side. We spoke with knowledgeable insiders on mobile games, music, and video, and today’s episode brings you the highlights.

NHK's Mobile TV Quiz Show

Japan’s NHK has announced they will broadcast one of the first programs to accept input from both remote control and cellular phone. A special Christmas Edition of the “Two Way TV World * Go Round” quiz show will add capabilities to accept input from up to four people per household. One person in the household will use the TV’s remote controller to respond to quiz questions, while three others will use their cellular phones. [in Japanese]

QUALCOMM Showcases BREW‚ Solution for WCDMA Market at 3G World Congress

QUALCOMM Incorporated, pioneer and world leader of Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) digital wireless technology, today announced that a number of compelling BREW-based wireless applications currently available via operators with CDMA2000® 1X services, can now be downloaded live and run on the BenQ S80 WCDMA (UMTS)/GSM/GPRS dual mode handset. The applications are being downloaded live over a WCDMA network, and shown on this BREW-enabled WCDMA device to operators throughout the Asia-Pacific region, at 3G World Congress, November 15-19 in Hong Kong. This functionality validates the BREW solution’s flexibility and value for the entire mobile marketplace value chain, including publishers and developers, handset manufacturers and operators in the emerging WCDMA market. The compelling selection of applications are running on handsets built upon QUALCOMM’s MSM6250™ Mobile Station Modem™ (MSM™) chipset providing developers with a feature-rich, multimedia environment for their innovative content.

Survey: GPS Usage on Mobile

NEPRO Japan published a report [in Japanese] giving results of a study into mobile phone GPS usage. At the moment, KDDI/au has more than 15 GPS-enabled models (DoCoMo has 2; Vodafone has none). In December 2003, au introduced their NAVI-Walk personal navigation service with an aggressive TV campaign presenting the advantages of mobile-phone GPS.

Apple Plans Music Downloads in Japan (Good Luck!)

A Reuters report cites yesterday’s Nihon Keizai Shimbun (newspaper) as saying that Apple Computer plans to start a music download service in Japan by March 2005. The Nikkei said Apple aimed to offer more than 100,000 songs with an emphasis on Japanese music at its “iTunes Music Store,” which is expected to be the largest music download service in the country. But it’s unlikely to happen exactly as Apple might wish, and here’s why.