Apple became the world’s leader at the number of vulnerabilities

Apple Corporation became the world’s leader at the number of vulnerabilities detected in its applications, writes Ars technica with reference to the research conducted by the company Secunia specialized in IT security.
Apple managed to overcome the former leader at the number of vulnerabilities – Oracle Corporation. The third place is occupied by Microsoft, HP, Adobe, IBM, VMWare, Cisco, Google and Mozilla Corporation are also in the top ten. In general, these 10 companies are responsible for 38 % of all detected vulnerabilities.
The report covering the first half of the year 2010 doesn’t reflect the seriousness of the detected errors, bugs and vulnerabilities. Thus, the products from Apple application developers can be rather safe if their disadvantages are very difficult to use for cracking.
Secunia has been keeping the record of vulnerabilities since 2005 and annually detects in average 4464 problems connected with security. More than 80 % of vulnerabilities allow cracking the system remotely, 10 % require for cracking the access to the local system and 8% require the access to the local network.

Apple updated MobileMe: iPhone can’t be stolen now

Apple has updated the data synchronization service for mobile devices MobileMe. The main innovation is the availability of thе application Find My iPhone for iPhones, Apple iPads and iPod touch players. It represents a port in the form of an individual client’s application of the service for finding stolen portable devices from Apple.

In other words, Find My iPhone is a branded ‘anti-stolen’ system – the user and the former owner of the device can see the interactive map where the position of the lost device is located with the help of GPS or antenna signals. He can not only apply to the police having provided them with the exact place where the device is but he can also send remotely the command for deleting all the data from the memory of the phone or he can display the message on the screen with the request to return the phone to its legal owner. The application itself is free, however, you’ll have to subscribe for MobileMe which costs $99 a month if you want to use it.

Earlier the information that Apple would annul the subscription fee for using MobileMe at the next update of the service appeared. However, it hasn’t happened. Probably this step will encourage iPhone apps developers to create cheaper applications for protecting personal data of the owners of Apple gadgets.
Apart from Find My iPhone, the update of the MobileMe service has touched its other components as well. In particular, the user’s web interface has been changed – the mail client has been adapted to wide screens (for iPhone 4), the possibility for creating and using the rules for sorting letters as well as the instrument panel for text formatting has been added.

Google accuses Apple of monopolizing the mobile advertising market

Recently Apple has changed the text of the agreement with the mobile application developers. In the new variant of the agreement, it is clearly stated that the company prohibits third party advertising agencies to collect the data about iPhone users through the applications created for this platform. Thus, de facto Apple bans third party advertising agencies from using contextual advertising as well as advertising which will one way or another react to users’ actions. However, such restrictions don’t apply to Apple itself.

The new rules will take effect from July 1, simultaneously with the launch of the new Apple mobile advertising platform — iAds. Google is sure that with such actions Apple simply cuts its way at the highly competitive advertising market.

The first version of the agreement with iPhone apps developers appeared in April. At that time it forbade transferring statistical data to ‘third party analytical companies’ which had helped in creating targeted advertisements. This step was accepted with dissatisfaction and led to the formal investigation from the side of the US Federal Trade Commission.

The updated version of the agreement differs by even harder limitations which, first of all, are directed to blocking large advertising network systems such as Google and Microsoft.

Android beats iPhone in China

According to the AdMob Company, working in the sphere of mobile advertisement, there are 10.7 mln iPhones and 8.7 mln devices based on Android in the USA. If other gadgets using iPhone OS are taken into account, the number of devices will increase up to 18.3 mln.

In some countries especially in Western Europe the Apple platform is still far ahead (and iPhone apps development is still in its prime), sometimes at the ration 10:1. China is the only country with the opposite situation.

Most devices working on iPhone OS are in North America (49%) and Western Europe (28%). Among countries the leaders are the USA (44%), Great Britain (9%), France (6%), Canada (5%) and Japan (4%).

What concerns ‘googlephones’, in April 75% of them were concentrated in North America, followed by Asia (12%) and Western Europe (11%).

It should be noted that AdMob counts only the devices connected to its advertising network. Apple states that it has sold 85 mln iPhone communicators and iPod touch players for the last three years and Google claims it activates one hundred thousand Android-based gadgets daily (and it provokes increase in the number of Android apps developers), but that’s quite difficult to find out how many phones are actually in use.

A month ago AdMob reported that for the first time the Android traffic of its network exceeded the traffic of iPhone devices in the USA.

Android has defeated Apple in the fight for the U.S. market

According to NPD Group iPhone OS was bypassed by Android OS in the United States in the first quarter of 2010. So, Google has 28% of the market, it puts them on the second place behind Research in Motion (36%), Apple is on third place with 21%.

According to the same research agency, this success of Android is connected with its close cooperation with mobile operators. For example, Verizon offers phones based on Android, as well as Blackberry offers its program “buy one get one free.” But in any case the only operator offering Apple phones, AT&T, is still the leader, owning 32% of the market. It followed by Verizon, actively gaining momentum and managing 30% of the U.S. market.

It is quite possible that Apple will regain its position after the release of the next-generation iPhone, which is expected this summer. But remember the fundamental difference between Android and iPhone, the latter don’t share its OS with third companies, establishing its rules for iPhone apps developers and alone collecting the cream from sales. By contrast Google is on a completely different way, giving its OS to everyone and allowing others make flourishing business from Android apps developments. Besides the exclusive contract between Apple and AT&T was signed for 5 years, which means that all this time Google will make a profit not only on the devices manufacturers, but also on active ads of mobile operators.

The other side of the coin is that Apple has never aspired to be the first. We don’t think that Steve Jobs cannot sleep because his company is somewhere on the third place.

Smartphones market finally recovers from crisis

The Digitimes analytical resource has informed that smartphones market exceeded level of pre-crisis period (2007) for the first time in the first quarter of 2010. During the 1Q 55.2 millions of smartphones were sold, and market growth amounted to 67% (compared to the first quarter of 2009).

Nokia becomes a leader on the market; it shipped 21.4 millions of smartphones and considerably strengthened its position in all the regions, particularly in South America. It is also noteworthy that share of Nokia touch screen models for the first time exceeded 50%. So, mobile software developers should consider this fact as a good sign for their innovative applications.

The second player on the smartphones market is RIM: it sold 10.59 millions of devices in the first quarter. It also managed to improve its position in Latin America: the growth was an impressive (297 percent!!!).
Apple is on the third place with 16% of the market. Last year it had only 11%. We sure that specialists who work at apps development for iPhones are happy for their beloved company .

iAd: new opportunities for iPhone apps developers

We all have already heard about iAd, this new Apple’s project. The company positions itself as a seller of expensive advertising services targeted at audience of solvent Internet users. Indeed, when iPhone appeared in the U.S., the statistics showed that family income of the most iPhone owners amounted at least to $ 100,000 a year. Of course, now this gadget has become much more available, but only people with above the average incomes are ready to pay for new iPhone applications and accessories regularly. So, the audience of advertising services from Apple is quite solvent.

The business model of iAd has not clear yet. In particular, the basis of payments wasn’t defined (the number of showings, clicks or users’ actions).

The whole advertising system will be centralized. All its content will be stored on company servers, and Apple sales managers will control the whole process. However, all the iPhone apps developers and advertising agencies will be able to create advertising for the iAd system. It was already announced that iPhone developers can integrate advertising system into their applications in just a couple of hours.

iAd from Apple: ads in mobile apps

This month Apple has introduced its new mobile advertising system iAd. It differs from competitors (for example, Google’s AdMob), because iAd integrated directly into iPhone OS. Moreover, these ads will be stored on Apple servers.

Advertisements will be interactive and will look like small applications. It is already known that some of them will be created using HTML5 technology. According to this new business model, iPhone apps developers will receive only 60% of proceeds from the iAd advertising.

The iAd system was announced by Apple CEO, Steve Jobs. According to his words, the average user works with iPhone mobile apps about half an hour a day. So, demonstrating new ads every three minutes the company will get about a billion hits a day.

Also Steve Jobs stressed that Apple is not going to focus on the quantity of advertising, on the contrary it will intend to raise its quality making from ads a new source of positive emotions.

The iAd platform will be integrated directly into the operating system, and will run ads within applications. Apple engineers want to change the approach to development of the most commercials: it is proposed to use not only text and image links, but multimedia applications that will be embedded into other applications ( such as games, readers, RSS-clients etc.). The platform will make its debut this summer.

Read also: Mobile Application Development: Boom in the IT World

Nokia wants to launch own “App Store” for mobile apps developers

Graig Williams, Managing Director of Nokia in South-eastern Europe, has admitted in his recent interview to Die Presse (the Internet edition) that his company developed a new product, which main task is to press Apple on mobile market. So, Williams has promised that Nokia will introduce a direct competitor for iPhone this year. This device is supposed to focus on network services. According to experts’ opinions, the very App Store, connecting iPhone apps developers and users, has greatly contributed to success of iPhone on mobile market. According to Greig Williams’s words, Nokia is going to create a similar, but more open service (without total control, as in Apple’s project).

By the way, the last Nokia’s multitasking OS Meego is meant not only for smartphones but for Tablet PCs also. In addition, Nokia plans to produce some new devices, based on this OS. However, Williams refuses to tell anything about future competitors of iPad.

Mobile OS Racing: BlackBerry, Android and iPhone. Who Wins and Who Loses?

comScore, a well known web statistics provider, released the results of its regular research. It conducted a study of the American mobile market, analyzing platforms of the most popular phones and smartphones.
So, BlackBerry smartphones kept their leadership in the USA. The comScore study covered the period from November, 2009 to February, 2010. And at this time BlackBerry occupied 43% of the market. This is 1.7% more than in August-October, 2009.

Nevertheless, positions of BlackBerry were threatened by the Android platform. This OS from Google, that took the fancy of mobile apps developers all over the world, demonstrated the highest growth rates. Android needed just a quarter to increase its presence in the United States from 2.8% to 7.1%. At the same time, the market share of mobile operating system from Microsoft declined from 19.7% to 15.7% during the analyzed period. On the other hand, there were no changes in the rates of iPhone: Apple smartphones stably occupied 25.1% of the U.S. market.

So, mobile application development for Android and iPhone platforms can be estimated as good investment in your future development.