Welcome to Gahtan’s Technology and Internet Law Blog

An interesting service recently mentioned on the PhoneBoy Blog is DID Worldwide. This services sells international DID numbers for about $5 per month that can be forwarded to third party SIP accounts (such as PhoneGnome). While there are free or cheaper alternatives for phone numbers in North America, the pricing is very attractive for many foreign locations.

If you need to log into AIM, Yahoo IM or MSN but don’t want to download and install a client application for each, and don’t want to download and install a crosss-platform program like Trillian, then you can either log into a web-based version of each service (AIM Express, MSN Web Messenger or Yahoo Web Messenger) or can use a single web-based service like meebo that supports multiple services at the same time. meebo is also useful if you plan on using IM from inside a corporate network that blocks certain ports used by IM programs or if you want to by-pass corporate systems that monitor IM conversations (an SSL version of meebo is available for “alpha” testing).

A mention on the PhoneBoy blog gave me the heads up on this service.

According to Wi-Fi Network News, AnchorFree is offering a free VPN service called Hotspot Shield.

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According to PCWorld, next year Seagate plans to ship its Hardware-Based Full Disc Encryption (FDE) technology on its on its upcoming range of 2.5-inch Momentus 5400 series drives (40G-byte, 80G-byte and 120G-byte versions). The FDE technology encrypts the stored data using Triple DES (Data Encryption Standard) but without a performance hit. While there are currently a number of software products that do full disk encryption, they typically need to be installed in the master boot record portion of the hard drive, thereby introducing compatibility problems with certain other software (such as disk imaging/backup software) and extract a performance hit.

Need to share a 3G / broadband wireless data service (GPRS, EDGE, EVDO, CDMA 1x, UMTS, etc.) among multiple devices? Top Global USA has a solution - their 3G Phoebus router. Simply plug in a compatible 3G pc-card (unfortunately support is not available for Sony Ericsson cards) and start sharing through Wi-Fi.

According to Untangled Life it looks like Belkin may also be developing a Skype-Compatible VOIP Wi-Fi Handset. Let’s hope they have enough sense to also build in a mini web browser so that the phone can be used at public hotspots that require authentication (a deficiency of the soon-to-be-shipped Netgear Skype Wifi handset). The ideal handset would have the web browser of the Linksys WIP 330 phone combined with Skype-software from the Netgear or Belkin phone.

Top U.S. law enforcement officials have been informally telling ISPs that they should retain customer records for longer periods (up to 2 years) in order to help police agencies with crime investigations. Some are also considering asking Congress to legislation minimum retention requirements.

From Wired News.