A US soldier discovered his missus had been playing away at home after spotting asuspicious “Mii” on his Nintendo Wii, the Evening Standard reports. The man, known only as Tony, returned from a year in Iraq to reports from chums that his wife had been cheating on him.

“All that changed when I plug in my Nintendo Wii… I see there is a Mii that I have not created.” The end result? “Tony has separated from his wife and filed for divorce,” the Standard notes.

According to the latest industry research, mobile handset customers–in the U.S. and abroad–have been snapping up smartphones at dizzying rates. The NPD Group reports that the percentage of smartphones sold during the third quarter increased to 11 percent of all handset sales in the U.S., up from just 4 percent one year earlier. The growth is equivalent to a stunning 163 percent rise from prior-year figures.

One reason for smartphones becoming more popular is that smartphone makers have been reducing the complexity of their smartphones, said Gartner’s Roberta Cozza. Touch-enabled smartphones from vendors such as Apple and HTC have been opening up new vistas for manufacturers beyond the Qwerty-style products popular with enterprise users.

Tired of irritating smudges, dust and fingerprints on laptop computer screens? LG.Philips LCD has come up with a dirt-resistant, easy-to-clean panel.

A special coating on screens used to reduce glare also had a tendency to retain dirt and oil, the company said. A second coating to make screens dirt-resistant was costly and time-consuming. Now, a single coating can do both jobs, LG.Philips said.

According to VG Chartz, a year after its release, the Wii has already managed to outsell the older Xbox 360 despite Nintendo’s continued shortages. Nintendo also displaced Sony as the largest first-party software maker, iSupply said in October. In short, a lot of people (including core gamers) enjoy Wii for what it is–a unique system with a focus on fun.

Notwithstanding Wii’s mass popularity, many gamers remain unconvinced, if not alienated by the motion-sensing console. It was the first home system to buck the industry trend of a graphics upgrade every five years, leaving Wii’s current library of unfamiliar games lacking in visual appeal when compared to the more realistic looking titles found on Xbox 360 and PS3. Furthermore, many long-time gamers fear that conventional games may decrease over time as casual games readily found on Wii and DS rise in popularity.

Security rivals Symantec and McAfee are hitting the market with competing products aimed at protecting mobile platforms. Symantec announced the launch of Norton Smartphone Security Nov. 20, which supports both Windows Mobile and Symbian OS and leverages Norton Antivirus technology and provides a firewall and anti-spam for SMS (Short Message Service). The move comes on the heels of the Nov. 19 announcement of McAfee’s VirusScan Mobile.

In a McAfee-sponsored study released in February, Informa Telecoms and Media reported that 83 percent of the 200 mobile operators surveyed have been hit by mobile device infections, and that nearly half of the operators that have experienced mobile malware outbreaks have had one within the last three months. However, the same study reported only five incidents where more than 100,000 mobile devices were affected by malware–a drop in the bucket compared to the number of mobile device users. Most of the incidents involved between 100 and 1,000 devices, according to the study.

A study has discovered that while retailers are physically securing their businesses to prevent theft, they are not taking the same precautions with their wireless security. The “2007 Retail Shopping Wireless Security Survey” conducted by AirDefense, tested the wireless “perimeters” of 3,000 shops across the United States and parts of Europe. It discovered that of 2,500 wireless devices such as laptops, handhelds, and barcode scanners detected, 85 percent of these were wide open to hacking.

This is mostly down to data leakage, misconfigured access points, outdated access point firmware, poor naming choices for access points, and a “cookie-cutter” technology approach by large retailers. The survey also monitored nearly 5,000 access points, and AirDefense discovered that 25 percent were unencrypted. The good news was that 74 percent were encrypted, but 25 percent used Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP), one of the weakest protocols for wireless data encryption. Forty-nine percent used Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) or WPA 2, the two strongest encryption protocols.

MDO Ltd. announced the release of eBoostr, a complete replacement for Microsoft ReadyBoost technology for Windows XP. Upgrading computer components can be costly, and is not always possible. Buying and plugging a USB flash memory stick, on the other hand, is neither expensive nor complicated. That is why Microsoft developed a new technology called ReadyBoost. ReadyBoost uses flash memory plugged into a computer to enhance operating system responsiveness, decrease loading time, and improve computer performance.

Unfortunately, Microsoft ReadyBoost is only available in Windows Vista. Since the day Microsoft announced its ReadyBoost technology for Windows Vista, the company made it clear that no ReadyBoost upgrade will be released to support Windows XP and older operating systems. eBoostr is a third-party implementation of speed-enhancing technology based on using flash memory to enhance the responsiveness and performance of a Windows XP computer. eBoostr works similar to Microsoft ReadyBoost, providing many of the same benefits to the end user.

The winners in Smartphone & Pocket PC Magazine’s Seventh Annual Best Software Awards for Windows Mobile software have been announced. One hundred members of the Smartphone & Pocket PC Magazine Board of Experts judged 889 Windows Mobile products in 188 Pocket PC and Smartphone categories. Winners are also listed in the Smartphone & Pocket PC Magazine 2008 Buyer’s Guide first seen late November.

Cybersquatters and phishers have beefed up their tactics for the holiday season making it difficult for online shoppers and frustrating for many businesses, according to analysts at MarkMonitor, a firm that tracks company brand abuse on the Internet. The company conducted a four week analysis in September to determine the state of brandjacking–a common problem brand names being abused on the Web.

Cybersquatting, the term used when a person hijacks a word or phrase using a Web domain to point to a site that isn’t owned by the trademark owner is among MarkMonitor’s top concerns headed into the holiday season. The practice rose 10% over the previous quarter and 20% year over year. It falls in line with expectations as the holiday season ramps up, said Frederick Felman, chief marketing officer of MarkMonitor.

PhatNotes is a notes organizer for Microsoft Windows based Pocket PC, Microsoft Windows Mobile based Smartphone, and Desktop PC. You can create notes providing them with category, subject, creation and modification date, which helps to find required information quickly and easily. With PhatNotes you can search for specific text in a specific field and sort notes by category, date, or subject. You can protect notes from unauthorized access with a password and send email messages directly from the Note Editor. Interface to the Contacts Database enables you to pick an email address instead of typing it in.

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