US wants Wikileaks Twitter data

8 January 2011 Last updated at 05:36 ET

The US government has subpoenaed the social networking site Twitter for personal details of people connected to Wikileaks, court documents show.

The US District Court in Virginia said it wanted information including user names, addresses, connection records, telephone numbers and payment details.

Those named include Wikileaks founder Julian Assange and an Icelandic MP.

The US is examining possible charges against Mr Assange over the leaking of 250,000 classified diplomatic cables.

Reports indicate the Department of Justice may seek to indict him on charges of conspiring to steal documents with Private First Class Bradley Manning, a US Army intelligence analyst.

Mr Manning is facing a court martial and up to 52 years in prison for allegedly sending Wikileaks the diplomatic cables, as well military logs about incidents in Afghanistan and Iraq and a classified military video.

'Given a message'

According to the court order issued on 14 December by the District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, the US Attorney's Office has provided evidence to show that the information held by Twitter is "relevant and material to an ongoing criminal investigation".

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Analysis

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As the Wikileaks saga has unfolded, Twitter has been one of the main forums where supporters and opponents of the whistle-blowing site have debated the issues. Now the social network has been dragged into the affair, as the US authorities pursue a case against Wikileaks.

This leaves Twitter executives in a very difficult position. Like all social networks, they have been keen to stress that they comply with local laws, especially when it comes to tracking down criminals. But they have also been eager to promote Twitter's role as a forum for free expression in countries like Iran.

If confidential details of overseas Twitter users are disclosed to the US authorities, how keen will an international audience be to trust this or other American social networks in future?

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The San Francisco-based website was given three days to respond was also told not to disclose that it had been served the subpoena, or the existence of the investigation.

However, the same court removed those restrictions on Wednesday and authorised Twitter to disclose the order to its customers.

The subpoena requested the details of Mr Assange, Pfc Manning and Icelandic MP Birgitta Jonsdottir, as well as Dutch hacker Rop Gonggrijp and US programmer Jacob Appelbaum, both of whom have previously worked with Wikileaks.

The information sought includes mailing addresses and billing information, connection records and session times, IP addresses used to access Twitter, email accounts, as well as the "means and source of payment".

Mr Assange condemned the court order on Saturday, saying it amounted to harassment.

"If the Iranian government was to attempt to coercively obtain this information from journalists and activists of foreign nations, human rights groups around the world would speak out," he said in a statement.

The order was unsealed "thanks to legal action by Twitter", he added.

Twitter has declined comment on the claim, saying only: "To help users protect their rights, it's our policy to notify users about law enforcement and governmental requests for their information, unless we are prevented by law from doing so."

Ms Jonsdottir, who until recently was a vocal supporter of Wikileaks, revealed on Friday that the Department of Justice had asked Twitter for her personal details and all of her tweets since November 2009.

She said she had 10 days to appeal against the subpoena.

Ms Jonsdottir wrote on her Twitter feed: "USA government wants to know about all my tweets and more since 1 November 2009. Do they realise I am a member of parliament in Iceland?"

She said that she would call Iceland's justice minister to discuss the request.

"I think I am being given a message, almost like someone breathing in a phone," she said.

Ms Jonsdottir was the chief sponsor of the Icelandic Modern Media Initiative (IMMI) law, which made Iceland an international haven for investigative journalism and free speech.

She has said she helped to produce a video for Wikileaks showing a US Apache helicopter shooting civilians in Iraq in 2007.

The classified video, released by Wikileaks last April, brought the whistle-blowing website to the world's attention.

The website's founder, Julian Assange, is currently fighting extradition from the UK to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning as part of an inquiry into alleged sex offences.

Ms Jonsdottir reportedly left Wikileaks late last year after she argued unsuccessfully that Mr Assange should take a low-profile role until his legal troubles were resolved.

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Piracy fears over Apple downloads

7 January 2011 Last updated at 05:49 ET

Pirates have targeted Apple's new software download service just one day after it launched.

Several groups claim to have found security flaws in the company's new Mac App Store, which launched on Thursday.

The new service allows people to find and download approved applications to their Apple computers.

However pirates suggest that the loopholes mean many pieces of paid-for software are vulnerable to unauthorised copying.

Apple chief executive Steve Jobs had hailed the launch as "innovative", but the company has yet to respond to the claims.

While Mac users have been able to purchase and install programs on their computers for many years, the Californian technology giant hopes the new system can emulate the success of its music and mobile download services.

The store has more than 1,000 programs for download, including best sellers such as Angry Birds and Twitter.

Apple scrutiny

Unlike ordinary software downloads, however, every program in the store is scrutinised by Apple and must pass a series of tests before gaining approval.

Almost immediately after the launch, however, pirates and Apple experts outlined a series of loopholes that could allow software to be copied or shared illegally.

One flaw, which only affects some applications including the popular Angry Birds game, involves simply copying and pasting the purchase code to allow paid-for programs to be used for free.

At the same time, a group known as Hackulous says it has developed a program called Kickback which can break the protection on any piece of App Store software.

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"Start Quote

We don't want to devalue applications and frustrate developers."

End Quote "Dissident" Representative of Hackulous

However the organisation, which has previously broken the copy protection systems used by the iPhone and iPad, says it will not release its work until next month.

"We're not going to release Kickback until well after the store's been established," said "Dissident", a spokesman for the group. "We don't want to devalue applications and frustrate developers."

Google battle

Although Apple's approval process is intended to boost security, prominent blogger John Gruber - who writes extensively about the company - said the loopholes showed gaps in the system.

"Apple should test for this in the review process, and reject paid apps that are susceptible to this simple technique," he wrote.

In the past the company has come under fire for the opaque nature of its approval scheme, which has sometimes resulted in applications being blocked without an obvious reason.

Most notably Google complained after its Voice application for the iPhone was turned down. It was eventually given approval, but only after a protracted battle between the two companies.

The news also comes after it emerged that as many as 50,000 fraudulently-obtained iTunes accounts were for sale on Chinese auction site TaoBao.

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Google phone bug misdirects texts

7 January 2011 Last updated at 10:25 ET

Google says it will fix a mobile phone bug that mistakenly sends text messages to the wrong people.

The glitch, which has hit a small portion of the company's Android mobile phones, first emerged last year.

Those affected say some of their texts have ended up in the hands of random recipients.

After investigating the issue, Google said it had "developed a fix" and would be rolling it out soon.

It is nearly a year since the problem was first reported, although the number of incidents appeared to increase last summer.

Initial examinations confused the problem with another, similar bug - but the company admitted yesterday that some users have seen their messages delivered to the incorrect recipient.

"It took us some time to reproduce this issue, as it appears that it's only occurring very rarely," said Nik Kralevich, an engineer on the Android security team.

"Even so, we've now managed to both reproduce it and develop a fix that we will deploy."

It is not clear, however, when users will actually receive the fix - or how it would happen.

Some mobile bugs require a complete software update - which would require plugging affected handsets into a computer - while others can be fixed remotely.

Potentially embarrassing

Although the company was keen to stress that only a tiny fraction of users have reported problems, some users say it has proven embarrassing and potentially costly.

"Today I sent a text asking about a contract from a potential employer - and it went to my current boss," wrote one user on Google's bug forum.

"If this hurts my career, I will be looking into legal action."

Tracking down the bug has become increasingly important for Google since Android - its system to power smartphones - has grown massively in popularity over the past year.

It has rocketed from having a share of just 3% of the worldwide smart phone market in 2009 to more than 25% today.

Most users affected suggested it is an inconvenient, rather than crippling, problem - but those who have experienced the glitch say that it has been troubling.

"I don't know where the SMS messages are going," Christina Bunce, a university programme leader from Falmouth, told the BBC.

"But I can see they have been sent and never arrived."

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Tablets do battle in Las Vegas

7 January 2011 Last updated at 07:21 ET By Maggie Shiels Technology reporter, BBC News, Las Vegas

The tablet wars are on and industry watchers say it will come down to a battle between Apple and Google for domination.

Apple's success with iPad, which has sold 7.5m, has spurred a number of competitors to enter the market.

At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, it has been estimated there are over 100 tablet computers on display.

At the show there were a number of devices powered by Google's Android operating system.

Google said it has more than 100 Android compatible devices from phones to tablets.

One of them is Motorola's XOOM which has been hailed by a number of bloggers and reviewers as a possible iPad killer.

The tributes come even though the Android 3.0 software which it will run on, is not quite finalised.

The Washington Post called it "the most promising iPad competitor" while Reuters news service noted that "Google stole the show" by unveiling its latest Android software which appears on the XOOM.

Motorola was only able to show a prototype of XOOM, with a final version ready to ship in the US in the next couple of months. There is no official note of when it will be available for sale in Europe at this stage or the price of the device.

The XOOM is Motorola's first tablet device. It has a 10.1 capacitive screen with the ability to show full HD video playback. It will also feature the expected features like accelerometer, gyroscope and Adobe Flash and there will be a rear and a front facing camera for making video calls.

Tablets showing off Google's Android operating system will turn heads, thinks IainThomson, US editor of technology blog V3.

"We are seeing Windows 7 on some slates but its Windows - it's not very sexy, it's not very exciting. So if we are talking about a battle between the two then it is definitely Apple going head to head with Android."

"Killer device"

Industry watcher Jonathan Roubini, editor of Lab Reviews, said Android 3.0 was key to the success of any iPad killer.

"All the Android operating systems have been for phones but with Android 3.0 you will have a dedicated OS that will let you do things on the tablet that gives you the feel of a real computer on a tablet device."

While Motorola shied away from calling their product an iPad killer, they were bullish about the challenge it poses to Apple for the next iteration of its successful tablet computer.

"The gauntlet has been thrown down to everybody," said Paul Nicholson, product marketing director for XOOM.

"This sets the bar. This is a tablet that shows what a tablet is supposed to be. It's the one everyone was waiting for this Christmas," he said.

"Competition"

So what of the iPad? To date it accounts for nearly half of the 16m tablets sold last year, reigniting a fading market for such devices.

It has been widely speculated that Apple will announce an upgraded version later this month.

Apple have refused to confirm or deny speculation about the iPad.

"I think at the moment Apple has a challenge on their hands but there have been plenty or rumours about an update and blueprints surfacing on the net about what it will look like," said Mr Thomson of V3.

"Long term Android will be the winner but for the next three or four years, Steve Jobs has nothing to worry about."

Mr Roubini agreed. "iPad is the big giant but as soon as people realise that Android can do better then it's going to be tough for iPad to remain the leader."

Tablet fest

Another player expected to announce a tablet in the very near future is HP.

Any device it unveils is expected to be based around the Palm operating system after it bought the company earlier in the year.

HP's chief technology officer Phil McKinney refused to confirm or deny details, but said the dominance of tablets at CES was hard to ignore.

"Someone said this (CES) is turning into a slate/tablet fest and we have said we will ship a WebOS slate in 2011.

"Generally any slate or tablet has to look at its application catalogue that is available to it. It's got to look at its connectivity option - how good is that online experience.

"Also that slate/tablet needs to work across your ecosystem of your devices. It can't be a stand alone data island. It's got to synchronise with your PC, or your phone or the cloud for example," added Mr McKinney.

HP has invited members of the press to an event it is hosting in San Francisco next month when it is expected to unveil a possible tablet.

"The onus is now on HP to shock and surprise," said Caroline McCarthy of technology news blog CNET.com

"It remains to be seen what they can deliver with the WebOS because Palm was losing market share when it was bought and consequently the WebOS system is not that highly anticipated."

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Stolen iTunes accounts for sale

6 January 2011 Last updated at 07:18 ET

Tens of thousands of fraudulent iTunes accounts are for sale on a major Chinese website, it has been revealed.

Around 50,000 accounts linked to stolen credit cards are listed on auction site TaoBao, the country's equivalent of eBay.

Buyers are promised temporary access to unlimited downloads from the service for as little as 1 yuan (10p) a time.

Apple, which recently stepped up iTunes' security after a series of break-ins, declined to comment.

However the company has warned users in recent months to safeguard their personal details.

Listings seen by the BBC tell buyers they can "go after anything they like" including "software, games, movies, music and so on". Several listings tell prospective buyers they can only use the accounts for 12 hours before it is likely to be shut down.

Details of the auctions first emerged in first emerged in the China's Global Times, which reported that one seller had admitted to the theft.

"Of course these accounts are hacked, otherwise how could they be so cheap?" they told the newspaper.

While it is not clear whether the accounts themselves were stolen, or whether they were set up with fraudulently obtained information, it is against the terms and conditions of iTunes to resell user identities.

Increased security

It is not the first time that users of the service have been targeted by fraudsters. In recent years the iTunes store has become an alluring target for criminals.

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"Start Quote

Until we receive a valid takedown request, we cannot take action."

End Quote Spokeswoman for TaoBao

Last summer an e-mail scam that targeted iTunes and PayPal left some victims facing credit card bills for thousands of pounds. At the time, Apple increased security checks to safeguard against fraud, and told users to be vigilant for signs of unauthorised activity.

And last month a Wolverhampton man admitted to being involved in a �500,000 fraud that used stolen credit cards to buy songs from the service.

TaoBao said that it was not required to remove the listings because it had not received any direct complaints about the sales.

"We take all reasonable and necessary measures to protect the rights of consumers who use Taobao, of our sellers and of third-parties," the company said in a statement. "Until we receive a valid takedown request, we cannot take action."

The Chinese company is one of the country's biggest internet success stories. It has more than 200 million users and is believed to have sold around 400 billion yuan (�38bn) of goods in the last year alone.

News of the fraudulent sales comes ahead of the launch of Apple's new Mac App Store later today.

The service is an attempt transfer the success of its iPhone app store to desktop and laptop computers. It requires programs to gain Apple's approval before they can go on sale - despite the fact that Mac users are already freely available to download programs from around the web.

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Global spam levels suddenly fall

6 January 2011 Last updated at 07:51 ET

The amount of junk e-mail being sent across the globe has seen a dramatic fall in recent months.

The volume of spam has dropped steadily since August, but the Christmas period saw a precipitous decline.

One security firm detected around 200 billion spam messages being sent each day in August, but just 50 billion in December.

While the reasons for the decline are not fully understood, spam watchers warn the lull may not last.

Around the Christmas holidays, three of the largest spam producers curtailed their activity, Paul Wood, a senior analyst at Symantec Hosted Solutions told BBC News.

"But it's hard to say why," he added.

Inactive botnets

The vast majority of spam is sent by networks of infected computers known as botnets.

One of these botnets, known as Rustock, was at its peak responsible for between 47% to 48% of all spam sent globally, said Mr Wood.

In December, Rustock was responsible for just 0.5% of global spam, he said.

At the same time, two other prominent spamming botnets, Lethic and Xarvester, also went quiet.

There have been huge drops in spam levels before, said Mr Wood.

"Usually they have been associated with the botnets being disrupted. As far as we can tell Rustock is still intact," he added.

That means those controlling Rustock could have continued churning out masses of spam, but for whatever reason, have chosen not to.

Chasing profit

One possible explanation is that the spammers are simply regrouping ahead of a new campaign.

Spammers are driven entirely by profit, said Carl Leonard, a researcher at security firm Websense.

"So if a campaign is not getting the returns they want, they can stop, regroup and try something else." he said.

Anti-spam campaigns have had enjoyed recent success in making life difficult for spammers, said Mr Wood.

In late September 2010, a collective known as Spamit announced it was closing because of "numerous negative events" and increased attention.

That has certainly contributed to the current decline in spam volumes, said Vincent Hanna, an investigator at anti-spam group Spamhaus.

"This was a significant operation, with assets all over the world. It's decision to stop operating - or at least lay low for a while - has made it more difficult for [other] spammers," he said.

That helps explain the longer-term drop, but the reason for the reduction in December in not yet understood, he added.

There have, however, been signs that spammers are turning to alternative methods to e-mail for distributing their messages - such as Facebook and Twitter, said Mr Leonard.

In December, Twitter accounts were hijacked to distribute diet pill spam after a list of possible passwords was published online.

Even so, it is still too early to say the current lull in activity will last, said Mr Leonard.

"For years there have been predictions that e-mail spam is set to decline," said Mr Leonard. "But for as long the spammers can generate profit from their activities, it's not going away."

Mr Wood said new spammers usually pop up to replace inactive ones.

"We've yet to see any evidence that spam has become a bad business to be in," he added.

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Microsoft uses mobile phone chips

5 January 2011 Last updated at 19:02 ET By Mark Ward Technology correspondent, BBC News, Las Vegas

Microsoft has shown a full version of Windows running on chips usually found in mobile phones.

The desktop version of Windows was demonstrated working with three processors built around chips designed by UK firm Arm.

The demonstration is significant because before now Windows has been closely connected with Intel chips.

Microsoft would not be drawn on when the first products using these chips would go on sale.

As well as running Windows, Microsoft also showed the work it was doing to get applications such as Word, Powerpoint and Internet Explorer running on Arm chips.

Microsoft was doing the work to get a full version of Windows running on mobile chips in a bid to end the compromises people typically have to make when using portable gadgets, said Steven Sinofsky, president of the Windows and Windows Live division during the demo.

Also, he said, turning to Arm designed chips should mean lower power consumption and much improved battery life for future gadgets.

About 80% of all mobiles, including Apple's iPhone4, are built around chips made from Arm designs.

'Next Windows generation'

During its demonstration, Microsoft showed Windows running natively on chips made by Qualcomm, Texas Instruments and Nvidia.

Microsoft has a mobile version of Windows, known as Windows Phone 7, that already runs on Arm-designed chips. But, said Mr Sinofsky, Windows Phone 7 was aimed at smaller devices and the full version would be for larger tablets, slates and netbooks.

Mr Sinofsky would not say which version of Windows was running on its demonstration devices. He would only say that it was the "next generation of Windows". Many took this to be a reference to Windows 8, which is due in 2012 and is expected to support multi-touch interfaces - capabilities missing from Windows 7.

He also refused to speculate when the first Arm-powered devices running the full version of Windows would appear.

"We've got the chip work done and now we start talking to partners about what kind of devices we can make," he said.

Microsoft was also continuing its work with long-time partners Intel and AMD to get Windows working on the low-power processors they were producing.

The demonstration came during a briefing at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas held prior to the formal opening of the show. Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer will give the opening keynote and is expected to expand on the firm's plans for Windows on Arm.

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Kinect blamed for Xbox failures

5 January 2011 Last updated at 11:32 ET By Melanie Abbott Radio 4's You and Yours

Owners of Microsoft's Xbox gaming console have blamed its new Kinect hands-free controller of causing their consoles to fail.

Console owners told the BBC that their machines crashed shortly after plugging in Kinect.

Kinect allows gamers to control onscreen action with body movements.

Microsoft has denied any link between Kinect and the three flashing light error signal, known as the "red ring of death".

Ten-year old Adam Winnifrith told BBC Radio 4's You and Yours he had only used his Xbox with the Kinect a couple of times before it failed.

Warning signals

"We plugged it in the day we got it but only played it a few times before we got the red lights. The next day when we tried it again we still had the red rings of death and haven't been able to use it since."

It is quite a shame as we got loads of new games for the Xbox too and I never had a chance to play them."

Adam's father James bought the Kinect for Adam and his four-year-old and eight-year-old brothers. Unfortunately for the Winnifrith family the warranty on their Xbox expired on 16 December, 2010.

"It's very disappointing. We were planning to have a big New Year's Day party with karaoke microphones and a Take That competition. But now the Xbox is just sitting idle," he said.

He says he is planning to ask Microsoft if they would consider fixing it as it is only just out of warranty.

Online gaming forums have also been buzzing with accounts of consoles showing the Red Ring of Death shortly after plugging in Kinects.

"I have never had a single issue with my Xbox. i got Kinect for Christmas and the screen starting freezing randomly. Then on New Year's eve... BAM I got the red ring. Very sad," read one.

"Yep, I got the Red rings of death on Christmas day The very same day my kids got a Kinect," read another.

Microsoft said the Kinect had been "designed to work with every Xbox 360 sold to date."

"There is no correlation between the three flashing red lights error and Kinect. Any new instances of the three flashing red lights error are merely coincidental," it added.

Microsoft sold more than 2.5 million of the devices in its first month on sale.

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Hackers uncover secret PS3 keys

5 January 2011 Last updated at 11:57 ET By Jonathan Fildes Technology reporter, BBC News

The PlayStation 3's security has been broken by hackers, potentially allowing anyone to run any software - including pirated games - on the console

A collective of hackers recently showed off a method that could force the system to reveal secret keys used to load software on to the machine.

A US hacker, who gained notoriety for unlocking Apple's iPhone, has now used a similar method to extract the PS3's master key and publish it online.

Sony declined to comment on the hack.

"The complete console is compromised - there is no recovery from this," said pytey, a member of the fail0verflow group of hackers, who revealed the initial exploit at the Chaos Communication Congress in Berlin in December.

"This is as bad as it gets - someone is getting into serious trouble at Sony right now."

The group, which has previously hacked Nintendo's Wii and says it is vehemently against games piracy, said that it had developed the hack so that it could install other operating systems and community - written software - known as homebrew - on the powerful machine.

"The details we provided and information and techniques we disclosed would have been enough to install Linux," he said. "We have no interest in piracy."

Following the presentation, US hacker George Hotz, who has previously hacked parts of the console, used a similar technique to extract the master key. He has now published it on his blog.

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"Start Quote

This is supposed to be the most secret of secret of secrets - it's the Crown jewels"

End Quote pytey

This formerly secret number is used to "sign" all games and software that run on the system, to authenticate that it is genuine and approved by Sony.

However, once the key is known it can be used to sign any software - including unofficial software and games.

"I hate that it enables piracy," said Mr Hotz. "The publication of the key is more academic than anything else."

The number also works for Sony's handheld console the PlayStation Portable, said Mr Hotz.

Developers have already started releasing tools to develop new software for the PS3 using the hacks.

'Valid target'

The PS3 - once regarded as the most secure of the game's consoles, and the only one not to have been permanently cracked - has in the last 12 months come under increasingly scrutiny from hackers.

In January 2010, Mr Hotz claimed to have cracked the console.

Following his initial announcement, Sony released an update disabling a function, called OtherOS, that allowed gamers to install a version of Linux on their machines, thought to have been exploited by Mr Hotz.

Many saw it as a pre-emptive strike to guard against games piracy.

Mr Hotz never released the exploit and publicly said that he had stopped work on the console.

But Sony's removal of OtherOS prompted other hackers to begin to look at the system more closely.

"It became a valid target," pytey told BBC News. "That was the motivation for us to hack it."

He said the team had spent "months" trying to find their way into the system.

"It was not trivial to do this," he said.

In the end, the flaw that allowed them to crack the system was a basic cryptographic error that allowed them to compute the private key, held by Sony, he said.

"Sony uses a private key, usually stored in a vault at the company's HQ, to mark firmware as valid and unmodified, and the PS3 only needs a public key to verify that the signature came from Sony.

"Applied correctly, it would take billions of years to derive the private key from the public key, or to make a signature without knowing the private key, even when you have all the computational power in the world at your disposal."

But the team found that Sony had made a "critical mistake" in how it implemented the security.

"The signing recipe requires that a random number be used as part of the calculation, with the caveat that that number must be truly random and not predictable in any way," the team said.

"However, Sony wrote their own signing software, which used a constant number for each signature."

This allowed the team to use "simple algebra" to uncover Sony's secret key, without access to it.

"This is supposed to be the most secret of secret of secrets - it's the Crown jewels," said pytey.

The team decided to publish its method but not the keys.

After the team revealed their hack, Mr Hotz said that he was prompted to renew his work on the system.

"What fun is a race if no-one else is running," he said. "fail0verflow did great work - they took it up a level."

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

It's my own hardware, I can run whatever I like on it"

End Quote Pytey

Using a similar technique he was able to extract the entire master key for the system, which he subsequently publish online along with a demonstration of it in action.

However, he has not released the method he used to extract the key.

"There is no reason to," he said.

However, he said that he may release a piece of software that will allow people to easily sign their own pieces of software and homemade games - known as homebrew - on to the console.

"I have a program running but am thinking of a good way to release it," he said.

Like fail0verflow, he said that he does not condone games piracy.

"I do not want it to be able to sign official Sony programs. I'd like it just to be able to sign homebrew."

fail0verflow said it "disagrees" with Mr Hotz's decision to release the key, saying that it expects them "to make piracy easier without accomplishing intrinsically useful".

Legal worry

Sony takes a dim view of people hacking its system.

Last year, a team released a USB dongle called PSjailbreak that contained software that allowed gamers to play homemade and pirated games on the PlayStation 3.

Sony updated its consoles to block the software and took legal action against distributors in many countries.

However, according to pytey, it may not be so easy to fix the problem this time.

"The only way to fix this is to issue new hardware," he said. "Sony will have to accept this."

He said that he thought his group was on safe legal ground with its work.

"I haven't stolen anything," he said. "It's my own hardware, I can run whatever I like on it.

But Mr Hotz was more cautious.

"I'm scared of being hit with a lawsuit," he admitted.

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Tablets to dominate gadget show

5 January 2011 Last updated at 05:39 ET By Mark Ward Technology correspondent, BBC News <!-- Embedding the video player --> <!-- This is the embedded player component -->

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A look at three useful gadgets at CES

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Tablets look set to hog the headlines at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Industry watchers expect 100 or more of the portable gadgets to be shown off at the four-day technology extravaganza.

About 120,000 people are expected to visit the 150,000 sq m (1.6m sq ft) of exhibition halls the show fills.

The devices are part of a trend towards greater mobility and smarter living that are starting to define some parts of the market in 2011.

Early estimates suggested only about 80 tablets would be on the stands at CES in 2011, said Shawn Dubravac, chief economist and director of research at the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) prior to the show opening.

"I would not be surprised to see 100 plus tablets at CES this year," he said.

Flat future

One of the first companies to unveil its range of tablet devices at the show was Taiwan's Asus, a company credited with kick-starting the netbook market with its Eee machine.

The company showed off four devices including the Eee Pad Transformer, which looks like a laptop but can split into two to allow the screen to function as a tablet.

Its machines run a combination of Google's Android operating system and Microsoft's Windows 7.

Asus chairman Jonney Shih credited Apple for kick-starting the tablet market with its iPad, as he unveiled the gadgets.

"We admire companies like Apple that offer great innovation, but they provide very limited choices for the customers," he said. "Different kinds of customers have different kinds of needs, and the best way to better serve them is to provide choice."

He also demonstrated the Eee Pad Slider, a tablet with a keyboard that slides out of its left side and its touchscreen Slate device.

Other companies including Lenovo and Motion Computing showed off Windows-based tablets. Lenovo also demonstrated a hybrid device that combined a 10-inch Android-powered tablet with a Windows-powered laptop base.

The device is currently only available in China.

Mr Dubravac said that not all the gadgets being shown would make it to the shop shelves, as both consumers and manufacturers were still finding out what they wanted to do with the devices.

"There's going to be a lot of competition and experimentation in this spectrum," he said.

While many of the tablets would be general computing devices, said Mr Dubravac, many would have very narrowly defined uses as manufacturers seek to set their tablet apart from the competition.

For instance, he said, it was likely that Research In Motion would target its Playbook at businesses and board rooms rather than consumers in the home.

'Dumb devices'

Although consumers were still finding out what they wanted to do with tablets, said Mr Dubravac, it was not clear that their appearance in large numbers was slowing down sales of a similar gadget with a very defined use: e-book readers.

This was because, he said, e-book readers tended to be cheaper than most tablets largely because the makers of the devices were tending to sell them initially at a loss because they knew they could make up the difference through sales of e-books.

The CEA expects, said Mr Dubravac, that between them, e-book readers and tablets should sell about 50 million units in 2011. He questioned estimates that suggested sales could be much higher because there was not enough manufacturing capacity or demand to sustain any larger market at the moment.

While manufacturers and consumers were feeling their way with tablets, CEA research suggests that maturing use of other devices will drive demand in the consumer electronics market.

For instance, Mr Dubravac said, smartphones were becoming the nexus through which previously dumb devices were acquiring intelligence. Body monitors were piping data they collect during exercise through a phone to help people get the most out of a work-out.

The useful data can only be collected because of another key consumer electronics trend, said Mr Dubravac which was the availability of small, cheap sensors such as accelerometers and gyroscopes. Widely used in smartphones they were also starting to show up in other gadgets such as digital cameras or goggles worn by skiers and snowboarders.

The final trend defining consumer electronics in 2011 and beyond would be the growing "applification" of products which seek to make products easier to use and interrogate through the use of small self-contained programs, or applications.

These trends, said Mr Dubravac, were shifting the focus of the consumer electronics industry.

"There's never been more demand for portable products," he said.

CES runs from 6 to 9 January in Las Vegas.

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