Last year 28 year old engineer Karsten Nohl, an encryption expert from Germany was able to crack the G.S.M. algorithm, a code developed in 1988 by the G.S.M. Association an industry group based in London. This algorythm still used today to protect the privacy of many mobile calls worldwide. Mr. Nohl was not only able to crack the code, he actually made it public by sharing it with others via the internet.

For the less technical folks, there are plenty of other options to find on the web. Some pretty stupid I have to admit (“How to Eavesdrop on a Cell Phone” from eHow.com) but some pretty scary:

The Interceptor AU688: Going for about 1,800 EUR (not cheap) promises to:

• Monitor both cellular A or cellular B system (B system used in Europe)
• Operates both in general monitoring mode and targets specific phone by number
• Identify unknown cellular mobile phone numbers
• Targets 20 mobile numbers for all calls made in or out

It’s not that hard for psychos, private detectives, stalkers or just regular joes to listen your private conversations, know your location and even retrieve data (such as SMS) from your phone.

Luckily some companies have picked up on this growing concern and offer encrypted phones such as the HTC P3470 running windows and modified to offer a more sophisticated encryption.

While most of us are not rock-stars, secret agents, politicians, CEOs, drug dealers or mafia bosses, the idea that someone else could listen to my conversations is a point of concern. I’d like to believe that even though I am not James Bond or Jason Bourne, my conversation still private to some extended. If there is ever some sort of encryption available for the iPhone. I’ll be the first one to get it.

One of the coolest application I’ve seen in a while.

More and more we see the emergence of Location Based Services for those using smartphones (or app-phones as I heard recently). Although there is not a definitive app the space is getting crowded.

Take for example Loopt, a company that offers a service to help you find your friends on the go. They are now introducing a new search service called Pulse. Not only it will provide suggestions according to where you are, but also based on your past history will generate a personalized and ever-changing list according to the time of day and also based on where you and your friends have been. This makes the suggestions and information even more relevant to the user. But that is not all. Pulse includes also a ranking to suggest places that are popular among other users. This opens a great deal of possibilities for the users and also for the retail and food industry who are planning to offer coupons to potential visitors. Everyone wins.

Last night I had a chat with my friend Alex Holden and he pointed out something that makes a lot of sense. How come popular sites like facebook for example are not picking up on the fact that people would like to know where their friends have been, or even if their friends are close by. Using a filtering system you can catalog people that you really know, people that you’ve met and people that you would like to meet.

Aka Aki is has a similar concept. So is Google Latitude. The problem is, that they are lagging behind in popularity. Even my 75 year old dad has a facebook account! Then again I wouldn’t be surprise if that feature will come sometime soon in a new update.

Happy slapping is nothing new. We’ve seen the documentaries, heard the stories and read the articles about it. What is surprising to me is how it keep spreading like a bad cancer among the young population around the world. Only a combined effort of equal intensity between citizens and organizations (governmental or not) will help find a solution for this criminal activity that is everything but happy.

According to the Times, it started in the London Borough of Lewisham around 2005, spreading to other countries faster than anyone could anticipate. Just like any other trend it was just a matter of time until we had the first cases here in Germany. According to the 2008 German study on mobile phones JIM, 28 percent of teenagers had at some point such videos in their mobile phones and shared them with others. “Lustiges Draufschlagen” or “Fröhliches Schlagen” is gradually becoming a real problem in playgrounds across German schools. In Bavaria, the police confiscated around 200 phones containing this sort of violent material from Teenagers ranging from 12 to 19 years old.

Handygewalt (Source: IZMF)

To counteract this stupid trend, the Informationszentrum Mobilfunk e.V. (IZMF) in cooperation with the Polizeilichen Kriminalprävention der Länder have created a short film called “Handygewalt” (translates something like mobile phone violence). Aimed directly to teenagers in school, the film portraits the consecuences for both the bully and the victim involved in the “happy slapping” (god I hate that name). The film is part of a group of a DVD set called “Abseits?!” touching on typical topics for teenagers. The plan as it now is to show the film to students in all German schools starting as soon as possible. Gemany hit the slappers back!

In case you are curious, there is an online version available. My son is eight and has a mobile phone, so he will be watching that film this weekend, no questions asked.

As a parent it is important to understand where this is going. While I am a sucker for technology, I came to realized that the social implications are yet to be further monitored and studied for a better understanding. The “Digital Natives” (everyone born during or after the 80′s) might had the luxury of being born in a time where technology grows exponentially, but just like everyone else, they can’t keep up with a such rapid pace. Happy Slapping is sadly a product partly created by the technology itself. Like media guru McLuhan predicted back in the day, the medium is the message.

Born Digital is one of the few books I’ve seen on the topic of understanding the impact of technology on the new generations. As a parent I’m glad a read the book. It made me ponder fundamental questions about my own life and the life I want for my son. While technology might be in part at fault, nothing beats good parenting. The game still the same, rules are just slightly different now.