Back in February this year, Verizon introduced budget friendly 3G prepaid plans which included the $60/month plan with 500MB of data and 2GB of data for $70/month. Both the plans include unlimited talk and texts. Now Big Red has quietly extended the amount of data allotted for each plan.

From now on, customers using BlackBerry, Android or iOS 3G smartphones will be able to enjoy 2GB of data with the $60 plan, while the $70 plan is coming with 4GB of mobile data. These new offers are available at the moment to existing customers. These won’t be available to new customers until June 6^th. And just in case you don’t know, these plans are just for 3G. There are no hints about the inclusion of LTE. And there are others around offering better plans, though everything will depend on the coverage that you get.

Are you currently using one of these plans? If yes, are you satisfied with the increase of data? Verizon’s 3G plans are expected to become cheaper while also offering more data in the future as more customers start using LTE.

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Motorola has confirmed that out of 6,200 refurbished Xoom Wi-Fi tablets, 100 of them were still bearing previous customers’ data when they were sold on Woot.com. That means data such as email messages, passwords, bank account details, and media like photos and videos could have been on those devices when they reached the hands of new customers. If such info reaches the wrong hands, the original users might end up having a lot of sleepless nights in the future.

Motorola hasn’t so far given out details regarding how exactly this happened. They are just saying that the “information that may be accessible to the purchasers of the impacted refurbished tablets may include any information that the original user elected to store on the tablet”.

But to make sure that the previous customers do not end up becoming victims of information abuse, the company is offering a free 2-year subscription to Experian ProtectMyID identity theft alert service. (If you returned a Xoom between March and October 2011, you can sign up for the service by calling (866) 926-9803).

Motorola intends to retrieve the data loaded tablets from the new buyers. If you bought a Xoom tablet from Woot.com between October and December 2011, you can check whether your device is one of those 100 devices.

And to stay away from such troubles in the future, we recommend you to reset your device to factory settings before returning it to the company or selling it to someone, if it powers on that is. You can also keep the memory card with you or just erase everything on it.

The post Motorola Slips and Ships Refurbed Xoom Tablets With Old Customer Data appeared first on Mobile Magazine.

The self-incriminating clause of the Fifth Amendment is always a great help for defendants who want to keep their encrypted hard drives from being decrypted when prosecution asks for it, until now. A Colorado federal judge has ruled that decrypting a computer hard drive does not violate the defendant’s rights.

The ruling came in a case against Ramona Fricosu, who is charged with mortgage fraud. She had argued that decrypting the data on her hard drive would require her to testify against herself, which is prohibited by the US Bill of Rights.

But Judge Robert Blackburn decided differently. According to him, “the Fifth Amendment is not implicated by requiring production of the unencrypted contents of the Toshiba Satellite M305 laptop computer”.

He cited the case of one Sebastien Boucher, who was asked to decrypt an incriminating hard drive, to support his ruling. In Boucher’s case, the court took the decision that, while the defendant’s encryption password was protected, the data on the drive could be considered evidence in the case.

Fricosu has been ordered to decrypt her drive no later than February 21 or face contempt of court. But her lawyers are fighting the decision and have asked for a stay.

But the question now is not whether Fricosu will be found guilty, but how courtrooms should consider access to data. Debates are on at the moment and the case is definitely going to be an important one considering the application of the Fifth Amendment rights in the digital age.

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