Update: Verizon has announced the iPhone, and it will launch on February 10, 2011, with the company accepting pre-orders starting on February 3. The iPhone model is slightly tweaked with buttons on the left side of the phone being pushed slightly higher, likely to address the antenna issues with the early models. All other sides look  identical to the AT&T version. There are some differences between Verizon and AT&T plans: Verizon is not offering consumers early phone upgrades, no global roaming, and no ability to simultaneously use voice and data features, as AT&T customers could. The company is expected to offer unlimited data for about $30 per month. The Verizon iPhone also offers hotspot support for up to five devices at the same time to share an Internet connection. The AT&T version does not, but applications for jailbroken iPhone devices are already available with even fewer restrictions. The Verizon iPhone does not come preinstalled with any third party applications, only traditional apps from Apple. It also does not have any branding to indicate the phone is from Verizon, rather, only Apple logos are on the device, just like you’d normally expect from any Apple product. The Verizon iPhone is operating on iOS 4.2.5, likely an OS that includes some tweaks for the CDMA version, without really any other differences except under-the-hood technical additions. When Verizon president and chief operating officer, Lowell McAdam, was asked about users not being able to simultaneously use voice and data, he replied, “people place different emphasis on things…they will make those sorts of tradeoffs,” he went on to say he couldn’t be happier at being able to tell people the iPhone is simply now available on Verizon. Mr. Seidenberg also said the company isn’t going for the Long Term Evolution network for now, just to get the iPhone working on its network ASAP. When asked about possible attenuation issues, he said there was sufficient time to make changes, and he expected the phone to work great on its 3G network. Despite the announcement, the Verizon stock (NYSE:VZ) is trading down about 20 basis points in mid-day trading.

According to people familiar with the matter who leaked information to The Wall Street Journal, Verizon wireless, the largest telecom carrier by the number of subscribers, tomorrow will announce that the company would carry Apple’s popular iPhone smartphone.

According to sources who spoke to The Wall Street Journal, an iPhone compatible version with Verizon networks would launch by the end of this month.

Reports also speculate that Verizon is preparing to provide unlimited data plans to entice consumers.

A significant number of iPhone users have long complained of poor reception associated with the AT&T network.

Read the full story

The world’s largest online search engine, Google, has updated its popular Google Goggles mobile search application, making it a whole lot smarter.

Google Goggles works by utilizing the camera in your smartphone to retrieve useful information in search results, essentially, you could snap pictures of objects, text, photos, people, landmarks, among other things, and the app then retrieves search results after scanning the photo.

Read the full story

The Ontario-based smartphone maker of the popular BlackBerry smartphone, Research In Motion (RIM), is seeking up to a two-year extension with the government of India as it works on meeting government requirements surrounding access to encrypted BlackBerry e-mails and messages.

RIM faced a nationwide BlackBerry ban in India in late August 2010 as the company held final stage negotiations that ultimately did not reach a consensus but still a ban was averted, which would have left more than 1.1-million mobile BlackBerry users without service in the country.

Read the full story

The $300-billion Cupertino-based tech giant, Apple, has announced that more than 1-million applications have been downloaded by Mac users from the company’s just launched Mac App Store.

The Mac App Store currently has over 1,000 applications in its index, including both premium paid and free applications.

It is only available for users running Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard or higher. Other Mac OS X versions, such as the upcoming 10.7 Lion will also be supported.

Read the full story

Google Android smartphone users previously reported technical bugs in the popular mobile operating related to the way SMS messages were being handled by Android.

The bugs caused the operating system to entirely mishandle text messages, some times even sending messages to unintended recipients without the sender knowing at all.

The now critically classified bug likely put many users at risk of sending possibly confidential information to other people in their address book, among other information.

Read the full story

Google long offered mapping technologies for a variety of mobile platforms with its mobile version of Google Maps that allowed users to track their GPS location and to conduct local searches, with the exception of turn-by-turn directions.

On October 30, 2009 when Google first announced it would offer free GPS turn-by-turn navigation starting with support for its Android mobile operating system, the stocks of traditional GPS manufacturers significantly dropped.

TomTom’s stock lost about half of its value, while Garmin’s stock lost about a quarter of its value.

As smartphones become ever more advanced with operating systems and hardware that support GPS navigation, more people are choosing to consolidate different devices into a single device such as a smartphone.

The trend has significantly lowered demand for standalone GPS units, causing traditional GPS makers to launch mobile versions of their software for smartphones.

Read the full story

The Japanese motor company, Honda, today issued an alert to U.S. customers concerning a security breach resulting from a hacked database.

The database that was managed by a third-party marketing group contained confidential information, including names of car owners, personal e-mail addresses, and even Vehicle Identification Numbers (VIN).

The company downplayed the breach, saying it would be very difficult for the hackers to actually utilize the stolen information to steal a person’s identity.

Read the full story

The Waterloo-based maker of the popular BlackBerry smartphone, Research In Motion, today published a new video demoing the browser capabilities of the company’s yet to be released BlackBerry PlayBook tablet computer.

The demo focuses on the browsing capabilities of the PlayBook, which include fully featured Java, HTML5 and Adobe Flash support that when combined truly offers a full PC like browsing experience on the company’s PlayBook tablet.

Read the full story

The world’s most popular online video teleconferencing company, Skype, has been served with a new patent infringement lawsuit by Gradient Enterprises, alleging the way Skype has setup its network infrastructure infringes on patents it holds.

Court documents filed by Gradient Enterprises on December 21, 2010 in a New York district court cite U.S. patent number 7,669,207, a patent that relates to how information systems detect, report, and respond to network node-level events.

Read the full story

Zynga Corporation, the company behind several popular games on the world’s largest social network, Facebook, has now earned the number one spot for its new game CityVille, which launched about a month ago.

The objective of CityVille is to build and manage a virtual city from the ground up, with social features that allow users to interact with other user built cities, including the ability to buy land and open store franchises, all with a common virtual currency.

Zynga earns revenue from CityVille as users purchase premium features to use in building their city, a business model that could earn the company up to $700-million in total revenue in this fiscal year, according to analyst expectations.

Read the full story