The week started with a short review of Tata Indicom’s website which has got a worth looking makeover. Next article notified us about another 3G service provider in the form of MTNL. They will be providing services as soon as they are allotted the spectrum.

Security is gaining more and more importance. But it seems RIM is compromising it to continue itself selling BlackBerry services in India and would be sharing the encryption key with the government. Next article highlighted the fact that Orkut has become a hub for users to share the telecom secrets and discuss the loopholes enabling the users to enjoy free GPRS and other services.

Another security loophole: This time it comes from government owned MTNL. MTNL’s website clearly lags behind in this Web 2.0 age but a more depressing fact is that their website included details of their customers. We have notified the authorities and as per their feedback, the situation is in control.

Airtel launched the Dial a Postpaid plan which will help them to gain more postpaid customers by giving them exciting benefits. Airtel announced that they will be selling HTC’s Touch Diamond phone which is reckoned to give iPhone a run for its money. Airtel has the exclusive rights to sell the phone. The last dose of Airtel is that they have launched their services in Lakshadweep islands.

Tata Indicom had launched a prepaid plan known as Go Speak Life giving users the freedom to call at 49 paise. Definite Steal according to us for users clocking more local calls. And lastly comes the Videocon’s announcement of starting their telecom services by mid-August and South India would be the first ones to experience them.

Electronics giant Videocon announced on Wednesday that it will start rolling out telecom services from mid-August. Videocon which has already acquired license for pan-India operations has got spectrum in three circles to begin with.

Videocon initially plans to launch its network in South India beginning from August 15 in Chennai. The Videocon group is aiming for 50 million subscribers in five years that would be 10 per cent of the Indian telecom market by then.

Calling at 49 paise to other operators is a very good deal. This is the USP of the Tata Indicom Go Speak Life plan, which was launched last month. This plan has been made available to the Prepaid users and the plan components are as follows:

• Starter pack at Rs.299
• Daily charge of Rs.1.50 as rental
• Lifetime validity
• Tata to other mobile phones @ 49 paise
• Tata to Tata, both mobile and Walky @ 39 paise
• Tata to Tata during night @ 29 paise
• Tata to other fixed lines @ 99 paise
• STD calling @ Rs. 2.49

We say: The calling rates are a definite steal and so are the other components. STD might be an expensive deal, but for a local user the overall package seems to be quite beneficial.

The beautiful island of Lakshadweep got its first private mobile service provider in the form of Airtel. Airtel will provide both prepaid and postpaid services.

Initially, Airtel will provide mobile services only in three islands of Kavaratti, Agatti and Bangaram. It has set up two towers in Kavaratti and one each in Agatti and Bangaram. Airtel has also tied up with 50 retail outlets across Lakshadweep to provide anytime recharge facility with Airtel Easy Charge and SIM card buying and registering facilities.

This move by Airtel will provide it with various first mover advantages and will hopefully see other services providers looking at this market.

Airtel announced the launch of HTC Touch Diamond with Airtel connection recently. The launch gives Airtel an edge over competitors in the premium phone market. The phone, which boasts about being better than all other phones in the market would help Airtel a lot. Here’s what the phone is all about:

• Touch sensitive
• 3D touch interface
• 4GB Internal Storage, 256MB flash, 192MB RAM
• Bluetooth 2.0
• 3.2 MP autofocus camera
• WiFi
• GPS/AGPS
• Google maps
• YouTube compatible

Continue Reading…

Airtel has announced a new plan known as Dial a Postpaid. This scheme comes with a tariff of Rs. 400 which enables the customer to enjoy 800 local minutes and SMS free of cost, additional local calls are charged at Rs. 0.50/minute and STD calls at Re. 1/minute. To lure the customers, Airtel will also be providing free assistance to transfer the data of the customer’s SIM Card to a new one.

We are not sure of the circles in which this scheme is being extended other than Tamil Nadu.

So we were talking about the possible security infringement in the previous post. But here we are with MTNL where they have kept important customer details on their website (of course for their internal purpose) like their name, address and contact numbers for the world to see. Their website is definitely not up to world class standards and a security loophole like this can feed the spammers appetite.

If MTNL guys are reading this, make the desired webpage private as soon as possible before the matter goes out of hand.

[Link not attached on purpose]

[Thanks, Tarun]

Which are the threads or forums that are the most accessed on Orkut? One of them is the kiddish games played and the other is cheap tactics of getting free services from your mobile. Yes, forums on Orkut are providing users with access to free GPRS and calling. Just punch in your email id or your contact number and the deatils would be forwarded to you.

Some of the threads read out:

• Free calls worldwide if you’ve got GPRS!!!
• Free secret code for all Mobile Phones
• Airtel Secret Codes
• FREE GPRS FOR MAHARASHTRA peoples

These are just a few of the codes and cheats that are being generated by small time tech geeks. Hundreds of users are readily giving contact details and availing themselves free services. We have no clue whether this really works, but the response is good, which is one reason to support this new face of piracy.

The BlackBerry saga is expected to come to an end. The Canadian firm has agreed to share the decryption key with the DoT giving them the access to user’s confidential data. However, the condition put by RIM is that DoT should take full responsibility in case of user’s data get leaked.

We can say that RIM has smartly hit two birds with one stone. Firstly, they will continue to sell their services and secondly if in case any discrepancy happens, they will not be liable. This does not seem a good move clearly jeopardizing user’s privacy.

3G, which is the next generation of mobile services, would now be launched by the public operator MTNL. The service, which would be provided to the users of Dolphin and Trump would allow them to make video calls and access to TV. The concept of IPTV without broadband has also been proposed.

The operator is waiting for spectrum allocation and once it gets the nod, it would be on its way to provide cutting edge technology based services to its users. MTNL hopes to compete on the prices, which it said would be lower compared to its competitors.

The official spokesperson also made a note about users being able to access data and video at the speed of 3.6 mbps. All such aspects would take the services to a whole new level, but would come at a high price too.