Depositing checks with your phone

NCR is now allowing customers to deposit checks anywhere they get reception on their data-enabled mobile phones, reports Gizmodo.

Your phone's camera, which must be at least 2-megapixels, acts as a scanner that captures an image of the check. APTRA then uses Mitek Systems' advanced recognition and image quality technologies to validate all data before transmitting those images directly to your financial institution or online banking web site.

The biggest win is that APTRA provides users with an extra level of convenience. Imagine, no more having to drop paper checks in the ATM, waiting in line at the bank during the crowded lunch hour rush or worse yet, tearing your hair out because you arrived five minutes after close. This is also a cost-effective way for financial institutions to manage customer checking, thereby helping to improve customer satisfaction and grow revenue.

Taliban gunmen shooting couple dead for adultery caught on camera phone

Taliban gunmen have been filmed executing a surprised couple whom they repeatedly shot for the alleged crime of adultery, reports The Telegraph.

Their deaths were squalid, riddled with bullets in a field near their home by Taliban gunmen as the execution was captured on a mobile telephone.

In footage which is being watched with horror by Pakistanis, the couple try to flee when they realise what is about to happen. But a gunman casually shoots the man and then the woman in the back with a burst of gunfire, leaving them bleeding in the dirt.

... Their "crime" was an alleged affair in their remote mountain village controlled by militants in an area that was only recently under the government's sway. It was the kind of barbarity that has become increasingly familiar across Pakistan as the Taliban tide has spread.

[via The Huffington Post]

$62,000 to download a movie?

$62,000 to download a movie? That's what happened to a caller named Alberto, who told his tale to CNN.

Alberto made the grave mistake of downloading Wall-E for his nephew while vacationing in Mexico over his data card and was slapped with a $62,000 bill from his wireless carrier when he returned home.

Alberto tried to contest the charge and the carrier reduced the bill to $17,000, arguing that the five-figure charge was what it cost them to deliver the movie.

[via arstechnica]

Photo show to support charities

Images of the Dalai Lama, Pele and the last living survivor of the Titanic are among a number of photos included in an unusual exhibition opening in Dublin today. The Irish Times reports.

A Thousand Reasons for Living, sponsored by Nokia is being held at Gallery One on Castle Street.

The exhibition by humanitarian worker, author and movie producer Don Mullan includes pictures of the famous and not-so-famous, buildings and sites of interest from around the world.

Mullan decided to use camera phones as the format encouraged spontaneity and forced him to get closer to people to take their picture, he said.

Mullan hopes to sell limited edition copies of a photographic portrait of Millvina Dean, the last living survivor of the Titanic. Now aged 95, Dean is living in a nursing home without financial support.

Image from SlideShare.

Ultrasound Imaging Now Possible with a Smartphone

Computer engineers at Washington University in St. Louis are bringing the minimalist approach to medical care and computing by coupling USB-based ultrasound probe technology with a smartphone, enabling a compact, mobile computational platform and a medical imaging device that fits in the palm of a hand. Cellular News reports.

... "You can carry around a probe and cell phone and image on the fly now," said William D. Richard, Ph.D., Washington University Associate Professor of Computer Science and Engineering. "Imagine having these smartphones in ambulances and emergency rooms." "On a larger scale, this kind of cell phone is a complete computer that runs Windows. It could become the essential computer of the Developing World, where trained medical personnel are scarce, but most of the population, as much as 90 percent, have access to a cell phone tower."

High School Teacher Recounts "Sexting" Ordeal That Ruined His Career

danah boyd tweet points to this "chilling story of educator in a sexting mess," and says "We should all be horrified by the prosectors' obsession with 'sexting'." Ting-Yi Oei, the Virginia high school teacher in question, is male. All charges against him have since been thrown out of court. But as in the case with Julie Amero, that final acquittal doesn't erase the personal and professional damage caused -- nor does it make up for the reckless tech-stupidity of prosecutors and school officials involved in the case.

Ting-Yi Oei's "sexting" witchhunt story begins about a year ago, when a fellow teacher told him about a rumor that some teens at the school were texting naked self-portraits around to one another.

[via boingboing]

Designer QR Codes

Mixing design with technological innovation, Tokyo based creative agency SET teamed up with Japanese artist Takashi Murakami and fashion designer Louis Vuitton to create a distinctive QR code featuring one of the artist’s characters and the classic LV pattern.

[via PSFK]

Other wonderful barcode designs:

-- Bar codes as art

-- Design QR Barcodes

-- Bar codes as art

-- Circle shape QR Codes

-- Whimsical barcodes

-- Color Barcodes

-- 2D Barcodes

Washington, D.C. will be 1st to get free mobile TV

Washington will be the first U.S. city to get free digital TV broadcasts for mobile devices like cell phones, laptop computers and in-car entertainment systems, broadcasters were set to announce Monday, reports The Sydney Morning Herald.

Broadcasts using new "mobile DTV" technology are expected to begin in late summer from five stations: local affiliates of CBS, NBC, PBS and Ion and one independent station owned by Fox.

The initial broadcasts will be identical to those beamed to TV sets, including the advertising.

Police delete London tourists' photos 'to prevent terrorism'

Austrian tourist Klaus Matzka and his teenage son Loris took several photographs of some of eLondon's sights, including the famous red double-decker buses and Vauxhall bus station, which Matzka regards as "modern sculpture". The Guardian reports.

But two policemen forced them to delete the photographs from their cameras in the name of preventing terrorism. They were told that photographing anything to do with transport was "strictly forbidden".

The policemen also recorded the pair's details, including passport numbers and hotel addresses.

... A spokeswoman for Metropolitan police said: "It is not the police's intention to prevent tourists from taking photographs and we are looking to the allegations made." The force said it had no knowledge of any ban on photographing public transport in the capital.

An odd thing to say since the UK launched a Counter-Terrorism advertising campaign last March warning about just that.

[via Régine del.icio.us]

Related:

-- UK launches Counter-Terrorism advertising campaign, including: "Observation and surveillance help terrorists plan attacks. Have you seen anyone taking pictures of security arrangements such as CCTV? Has it made you suspicious?

-- Street photographers fear for their art amid climate of suspicion - With public concern rising over paedophilia and terrorism, street photographers face new difficulties.

Camera Zoom app for iPhone

The Camera Zoom app allows you to zoom in and out in real-time when taking pictures, by just simply moving the slider.

Features:

-- Up to 4x digital zoom
-- Realtime zooming camera preview
-- Adjusts photo to best quality automatically
-- Built-in camera roll photos preview
-- Customize zoom sliders position
-- Fullscreen shutter optional, tap anywhere to take pictures
-- Ask before saving a photo optional

Mobile App Uses Phone Camera as Virtual Eyes

iVisit, a audio and video conferencing company, is showing off an interesting technology using mobile phones that act as virtual eyes to help visually challenged users. Wired reports.

The technology called SeeScan allows users to point their cellphones at an object and have it identified in real-time. For instance users can point a phone at a at a can of Coke or a pack of frosted flakes or a bottle of shampoo and have the name of it read loud to them near-instantaneously.

The concept known as augmented reality, or a field that blends real world and computer generated data, is something companies are increasingly focusing on.

SeeScan though works only with packaged goods including currency but what's interesting to see is how iVisit has been able to make real-time object recognition work with a mobile processor.

Read full article.

New Exilim Casio steams up YouTube

Casio took an unusual approach to confirming the existence of a rumored Exilim camera phone: a steamy YouTube video Thursday.

The video video has been taken down, but word is it showed a young woman in the shower with the phone in hand, to show that it's water-resistant.

[via News.com]

A vacuum cleaner controlled by videophone

Spotted on Unwired View, a cleaning robot which can be controlled via 3G mobile phones.

Built in collaboration with the Korean company Microbot, the CW100 robot – which is actually a very smart vacuum cleaner – uses video calling to send live images to your phone. By seeing what the robot sees, you can remotely control its actions, helped by your phone’s keypad.

KTF says the new robot can also be used for monitoring kids, elders or pets at home.

[via Phone Reviews]

Cell Phone Video Clears Man of Rape Charge

A UK businessman has been cleared of raping a university student after jurors were shown a video of the sex session taken on a mobile phone. The footage showed the woman 'actively' performing a sex act on him.

[The Daily Mail via Switched]

BBC launches 24-hour live TV streaming mobile service

The BBC has debuted its 24-hour live television streaming website for mobile devices. The service currently has eight channels, including five general news streams, one BBC Parliament stream, and CBBC and CBeebies children's programming.

The service will not work over-the-air, and it is only available for U.K. residents. Users can see the streaming video service by visiting BBC Mobile.

[via MobileBurn]

Video of Taliban Flogging Rattles Pakistan

Mobile phone footage of a teenage girl being flogged publicly in Pakistan’s Swat Valley is now circulating widely.

The video, reports The New York Times, shows a young woman held face down as a Taliban commander whips her repeatedly with a leather strap. “Leave me for the moment — you can beat me again later,” she screams, pleading for a reprieve and writhing in pain.

The woman in the video is a 17-year-old resident of Kabal, in the restive Swat region in northwestern Pakistan.

The images, which have been broadcast repeatedly by private television news networks in Pakistan, have caused outrage here and set off bitter condemnation by rights activists and politicians.

It was not clear what the young woman was accused of.

One account said she had stepped out of her house without being escorted by a male family member, according to Samar Minallah, a rights activist. Ms. Minallah said she distributed the video to local news outlets after it was sent to her by someone from Swat three days ago.

Another account said a local Taliban commander had falsely accused the teenager of violating Islamic law after she refused to accept his marriage proposal.

Read full article in the NY Times.

Federal Judge Sides with Teen Girls in Pa. Cell-phone ‘Sexting’ Case

A federal district judge in Allentown, Pa., has temporarily barred the district attorney of Wyoming County, Pa., from prosecuting three teen girls on felony child pornography charges for circulating two semi-nude photos of themselves to their classmates via cell phones two years ago. CNS News reports.

In one of the pictures, two 13-year-old girls posed together wearing bras, according to court documents. The other photo depicted a teen girl who was naked from the waist up.

The ACLU, representing the teens' parents, had filed suit against Wyoming County District Attorney George Skumanick Jr, who had said he would pursue felony charges against the girls unless they agreed to participate in a five-week after-school sexual-harassment program and probation.

“Here you have a prosecutor threatening children with very serious felony charges when he has no basis in law to do so,” said Vic Walczak, legal director for ACLU Pennsylvania and the plaintiffs’ attorney in the case.

Walczak and the ACLU also claim that the images are protected First Amendment speech – and that the girls didn't consent to having their pictures distributed.

The federal judge agreed with the ACLU.

Read full article.

Related: - Prosecutor sued over semi-nude teen photos case

Nokia's Point & Find gives new life to the camera phone

At its CTIA booth Nokia showed a new camera phone application that will allow users to get information about object by taking its picture. Point & Find is a downloadable app that uses real-time image processing and recognition technologies to access information related to books, movies, DVDs and similar media content.

[via Crave]

Picsplode app

Piscplode lets you take a picture with your iPhone, then shake to shatter it into a thousand pieces. Why you may ask? Well, because you can.

In their own words: A high-performance particle system renders your now-shattered picture at a smooth 25 frames-per-second.

Tilt your phone and watch the bouncing particles react to the change in gravity.

Use your finger to touch particles, launching them into the air.

When you are done, double-tap to watch the particles reassemble themselves into the original picture.