June 10, 2004
Sprint puts lens cap on camera phones
The corporate backlash against mobile phones with built-in cameras has spurred Sprint to remove the lens from one of their best-selling models, reports the Financial Times.
"The extraordinarily rapid growth and popularity of camera phones, most of which can also take and instantly send short video clips as well as still images, has made these devices the target of corporate security criticism.
In some countries, such as Japan, most mobile phones come with built-in cameras and it has become harder for corporate customers to find phones without.
Sprint, US mobile phone operator, said it was introducing the camera-less Treo 600 in response to corporate customers' demands".
See Sprint's Press Release and Alan Reiter's take in Cameraphone Report.
On my part, I think Sprint's play on corporate security fears is just a marketing ploy. It's just a way of positioning a new handset. And I think it's very clever.
You don't actually look like your talking on the phone or sending a text message while in fact you are snapping a picture of something confidentiel, the way you hold yourself and your cell phone is quite different.
I always come back to this interesting post in Japan's Keitai Log last September, describing how in Japan people now recognize someone taking a picture with a cameraphone, based simply on their posture.
Camera phone paranoia can only be caused by it's dual function, taking a picture and being able to send it with immediacy. These two technologies combined obviously continue to poeple's imagination of worst case scenarios.
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