Oxygen Software announced the release of Oxygen Phone Manager II for Symbian OS smartphones v2.7.6. This version introduces an extended forensic mode of data access. While users gain total access to the content of Symbian-powered phones, they leave data in pristine order with no traceable changes. The feature, which was first implemented in Oxygen Phone Manager I and stood in good stead for police investigations, is now available in the smartphone edition of the program.

A laptop computer containing names, social security numbers, and other sensitive information of 161,000 current and former employees of Boeing was stolen recently, the U.S. aerospace manufacturer said Friday. Some of the employee information on the laptop included banking information and birth dates, Boeing said, adding that there was no evidence any of the information was misused. The laptop was not stolen from a Boeing site, the company said. They did not say where the theft took place.

ChatGuard is the first software program that monitors and takes control of chat sessions accessed by online sexual predators. Monitoring is done by recognizing words and phrases specific to online predators. Once detected, the chat is dropped, the session is logged, and the user name of the solicitor is blocked from any future contact with any and all computers running ChatGuard software.

Sony may lose its iron grip on the market for game machines as rival Microsoft launches a new model just in time for the holiday season. Microsoft’s new Xbox 360 debuted yesterday in the United States, and in Europe and Japan in December, while Sony is not expected to launch its upgraded Playstation, PS3, until next spring. Analysts and game fans say PS3 is the sexier game machine with twice the processing speed of Xbox 360, next-generation DVD technology Blu-ray, and seven control pads that can connect wirelessly to the console. But Xbox 360 will have the advantage of being in time for the holidays with an initial line-up of 18 games.

DataViz announced an update for its mobile Office suite on the Symbian OS based UIQ platform, Documents To Go. New usability improvements, such as the ability to sort data in spreadsheets, are included in this “Symbian-Signed” solution to make it even easier to access important data and edit business-critical documents on the go. Additionally, a new Spanish localized version is available.

Microsoft said Friday that it has updated its handheld synchronization software to address a glitch that had affected some customers. The software maker said ActiveSync 4.1 should fix problems that some buyers of new handhelds encountered when trying to share information with a PC. The issue affected devices that were running Microsoft’s Windows Mobile 5 operating system and that tried to connect to a computer over a USB connection, particularly when a firewall or parental control software was in use.

The government’s stance on VOIP is creating uncertainty for many network providers heading into 2006. Protesting that new federal wiretapping rules will stifle innovation and require the re-engineering of private IP networks at a huge expense, universities, ISPs, libraries and privacy organizations, along with Sun Microsystems, are going to court to overturn the rules. Two petitions were filed last month challenging the Federal Communications Commission’s decision to apply the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA, to voice-over-IP providers whose networks connect with the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network). Sun joined the Center for Democracy and Technology, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, Pulver.com, Comptel and the American Library Association in filing a petition with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

TiVo is expanding its video recording service so users will be able to transfer recorded television shows onto Apple Computer’s iPods or Sony’s PlayStation Portable–the latest move aimed at putting TV in people’s hands for viewing anywhere. The enhanced TiVoToGo feature will also add more copy-protection measures to discourage possible copyright abuse that would anger Hollywood. TiVo officials said shows recorded via TiVoToGo will have digital watermarks. The extra encoding will follow the copied program wherever it goes, giving TiVo the ability to trace the origin of a transferred program that might get posted freely onto the Internet.

Verizon Wireless and Research In Motion introduced the BlackBerry 7130e, the first BlackBerry handset that takes advantage of Verizon Wireless’ BroadbandAccess service on the company’s Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO) network. Coupled with Verizon Wireless’ new BroadbandAccess Connect pricing, the BlackBerry 7130e delivers all the popular email and data capabilities available with the BlackBerry wireless platform and can also serve as a modem for customers who want to use the device to connect their laptop with Verizon Wireless’ BroadbandAccess service.

A critical vulnerability, found in some versions of Apple Computer’s popular iTunes, could enable attackers to remotely take over a user’s computer, according to a warning issued Thursday. The discovery of this flaw comes days after Apple issued its security update for iTunes 6 for Windows. This flaw existed on the earlier version of iTunes 6 for Windows and was not addressed by the newest security update, according to a warning issued by eEye Digital Security.