mobile

This is new territory for online safety – the technology that allows cellphone users to pinpoint their friends' physical location with their phones. The only thing that's regulated about this in the US is the Federal Communications Commission's 1999 requirement that "cell phone companies implant location-tracking receivers in handsets," Business Week reports. On the safety and privacy front, … [Read more...] about Pinpointing peers

...is good news for videogamers, who like battling it out in person, in groups, and with unlimited bandwidth (provided by a LAN, or "local-area network," that connects them all for playing tournaments). Thus this logical new use for strip-mall space: gaming centers, where - for around $6/hour - gamers can have their LAN without having to mess with dragging in and setting up their own CPUs. One … [Read more...] about More LAN party locations…

Nearly half of US parents keep tabs on their kids' online activities daily or weekly, according to a survey just released by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and Cox Communications. The other half (51%) "say they don't have monitoring software on household computers that teenagers use or don't know whether their computers have such software," CNET reports, and 42% don't review … [Read more...] about Parents monitoring kids: Study

Using the Web will only get the word about an abducted child out faster and to more people, "including ordinary citizens who can receive text messages on their cellphones," the New York Times reports. The new Net-based Amber Alert system is being tested in 13 states this summer. The Times cites figures from the National Center for Missing & Ecploited Children showing that 250-300 Amber Alerts are … [Read more...] about New online Amber Alert