A record number of smartphones will jump on the LTE bandwagon before the year is over. Eyeing a “breakout year” for 4G technology, Strategy Analytics expects LTE phone shipments to grow 10-fold in 2012, rising to 67 million units from just 6.8 million last year. The push is being driven across the entire industry. “Multiple …

AT&T is using T-Mobile’s recent layoffs as an excuse to bash the FCC and its rejection of AT&T’s proposed $39 billion acquisition of T-Mobile USA. On Friday AT&T’s head of legislative affairs Jim Cicconi issued a statement offering a big fat “I told you so,” to the FCC. T-Mobile recently announced it was laying off 1,900 workers in seven call …

Video chatting in Hangouts is busting out of Google+. Video calls among two or more Google+ users was the big draw when Hangouts launched, but now Google has flipped the switch the allow Google+ users to make phone calls to almost any phone number, not just within the Google+ ecosystem. That means that users will be able, for example, place …

If you lie awake at night worrying about faceless organisations listening in to your mobile phone calls and making judgements on the minutiae of your miserable life, then help is at hand. The Tripleton Enigma E2 is being billed as the world’s most secure mobile — and it has a serious price-tag to match: £1,320. Sure, it may look just …

In an age of clone phones, it’s refreshing to come across a handset with a character of its own. It might be just me, but the combination of the aesthetics and its software interface on the Huawei Pinnacle for MetroPCS struck a chord. With the vast majority of the phones I touch being Android handsets, using the Pinnacle made an …

O2 has joined Vodafone in a moan about Ofcom’s plan to let Orange and T-Mobile get 4G services in the UK up and running by the end of this year. The oxygenated operator says the watchdog’s decision is “contradictory to its objective of delivering a competitive market environment”. Miaow! United under the ludicrous Everything Everywhere banner, Orange and T-Mobile are …

Research In Motion plans to give software developers prototypes running the new BlackBerry 10 software in early May, according to Bloomberg News. Alec Saunders, RIM’s vice president of developer relations said the company will hand out as many as 2,000 devices using the BlackBerry 10 software at the company’s BlackBerry Jam conference in Orlando, Fla. in early May. Saunders said …

Fears that the new iPad suffers from an overheating issue look to have been put to rest, thanks to an exhaustive investigation from our US sister site CNET.com, which concludes that while Apple’s new tablet does indeed get hotter than its predecessor, it’s not too hot. Our buddies across the Atlantic broke out the infrared thermometer gun, testing both the …

Can’t get enough “Hunger Games”? Need something to do while you’re in line to buy movie tickets? (The film version opens today, in case you’ve been living underground.) Get ready for some Katniss-inspired app action. The Hunger Games: Girl on Fire for iOS has arrived, and while it may be little more than a “teaser” game (the studio’s words, not …

Nokia has stuck a stick in Apple’s spokes. The Finnish phone-fanciers have come out fighting as the mobile industry prepares to vote on the next generation of SIM card, the nano-SIM. Apple has proposed a design for the fourth form factor (4FF) nano-SIM, which it wants the European Telecommunications Standards Institute to adopt as a standard for all phones. Nokia, …