Sony landed a U.S. patent (10,083,288) Tuesday for a method of unlocking a smartphone using a “simulated parallaxing” 3D scene on the phone’s touch screen, Patent and Trademark Office records show. Many “authentication techniques that involve a lock screen” to control access to a phone’s “full functionality” can have their “drawbacks,” said the patent, which names David de Leon, former director-interaction at Sony Mobile Communication in Sweden, as its only inventor and is based on a March 2014 application. It’s easy to forget a PIN or password, and even modern “biometric” techniques for unlocking a phone aren’t infallible, it said. The method it describes provides for a “relatively fast and easy to remember unlocking action” that affords a “reasonable level of access security” by dragging a finger on the parallaxing 3D scene to reveal a hidden “predetermined target object,” it says. Manipulating the object through finger “gestures” can “satisfy the input requirements to unlock the electronic device if the revealing of the hidden object is accomplished by two or more distinct motions performed in a predetermined order,” it says. Sony didn’t comment Tuesday on plans to commercialize the invention.

The Associated Carrier Group (ACG), Sprint and Competitive Carriers Association said Monday they agreed to integrate the CCA Device Hub into ACG. It's "another critical step in allowing small- to medium-sized carriers access to niche products and other devices that are challenging to secure,” said ACG President Russ Lipinski. The ACG consortium “enables its members to work with manufacturers, suppliers and other vendors to quickly develop and procure scarce or difficult to obtain products through economies of scale and standardization of coding and other features,” said a news release.

Federal Emergency Management Agency officials expect the same kinds of problems to be uncovered during the first national test of the wireless emergency alert system as during a Washington-area test in April, they told reporters Friday. Preliminary results likely won’t be released immediately, an FCC official said. The test was delayed until Oct. 3 because of Hurricane Florence (see 1809170035). The April test saw many subscribers not getting the alerts (see 1804050053). Industry observers expect similar glitches Oct. 3. “The test will assess the operation readiness of the infrastructure,” a FEMA official said: “We expect there to be fairly similar results” to the April test. Government officials spoke on a conference call with reporters on the condition they not be identified. “Almost all [wireless] phones across the country” will receive the warnings, “but we know there are some anomalies in the network,” a FEMA official said. More than 70 percent of the cellphones will likely “receive and display” the message, the official said. The FCC will work closely with FEMA and industry to assess the test, a commission official said. FEMA officials noted 2016's Integrated Public Alert and Warning System Modernization Act requires the system be tested every three years. WEAs can warn of severe weather, active shooters and Amber alerts. WEAs fall into three categories -- warnings of imminent threats from severe weather to active shooters, amber alerts for missing children and the presidential-level alert, a FEMA official said. The national presidential-level alerts are only issued during extreme emergencies, such as a declaration of war or if there were coordinated terrorist attacks in major cities, the FEMA official said. Those concerned about the test continue tweeting, now using a new hashtag: #GoDark103. “What are you solving by participating in #GoDark920 or #GoDark103?” @realchrishanken tweeted Friday. “You don’t like Trump. I get it. I don’t like him either. But these presidential alerts have been around for longer.”

The iPhone Xs has an “upgrade” Apple didn’t mention in its publicity materials, in the form of an L-shaped single-cell battery, said Fixit in a teardown analysis. “The new design approach for non-rectangular batteries removes material from the electrode layers before they are stacked,” said the right-to-repair advocacy firm. Apple “has been filing patents in this direction” for the past seven years, it said. “The challenge with any lithium-polymer battery cell is that each corner needs to be sealed to prevent undue stress from thermal expansion,” it said. Since the battery on the Xs has six sides compared with the conventional four, “those extra corners can be tricky,” it said. “To reduce the stress on the corners, Apple notched the internal corner of the battery,” a “dramatic shift” that “opens up a lot of design possibilities,” it said. One possible tradeoff is that the large notch brings about a 2 percent capacity decrease in the battery of the Xs compared with that of the iPhone X, it said: “Only time will tell how this new cell performs with age.”

The FCC Public Safety Bureau Monday sought comment on an August report by CTIA and the national wireless carriers on vertical accuracy (z-axis) for wireless calls to 911. The report by Location Technologies Test Bed, the test bed administrator, “describes the testing process used to assess vertical location solutions … and provides the results of the testing,” the bureau said. The report notes that two vendors, NextNav and Polaris, took part in tests. The technologies they offer “rely on barometric pressure sensor information from mobile wireless handsets to determine an estimated altitude of an indoor wireless 9-1-1 call,” the bureau said. Comments are due Oct. 1 in docket 07-114, replies Oct. 11.

Berkeley “may convey whatever unfounded, anti-science message about cell phones it wishes, based on its own opinion of scientific studies, but it may not conscript CTIA’s members into delivering that message for it,” CTIA said in a reply brief (in Pacer) last week at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The California city last month argued that the Supreme Court exempted health and safety warnings and factual, uncontroversial disclosures about commercial products when the high court rejected a California disclosure law in National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra (see 1808170019). Berkeley changed its justification for the law during the case, recently recasting it as a health and safety warning to “evade … heightened scrutiny” under the NIFLA decision, CTIA said. “No matter the type of interest at issue, government is never entitled to mandate a misleading message.” Berkeley's "message is misleading and controversial" because it invokes the FCC’s authority to frighten consumers" even though the commission says any cellphone legally sold in the U.S. is safe, the wireless association said.

As it looks to unload some mobile traffic carried via its mobile virtual network operator, Charter Communications is considering licensed as well as unlicensed spectrum and Wi-Fi, Chief Financial Officer Chris Winfrey told analysts Thursday. He said the company is doing tests to evaluate 3.5 GHz spectrum and hopes to do the same with 3.7-4.2 GHz spectrum. Asked about 5G competition, he said it's unlikely to be direct competition for fixed line service, though Charter likely will employ 5G in some limited use cases or in partnership with other operators. He said Charter's footprint-wide rollout of its Spectrum Mobile service (see 1809040003) -- as well as other cable operators' own mobile offerings -- could help push broadband penetration broadly since customers could get web and mobile service at bundled pricing comparable to what many pay for mobile service alone. He said the Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks integration "has gone extremely well" and New Charter will operate as a single cable system by early next year. He said New Charter's conversion to all digital and all DOCSIS 3.1 will be done by year's end. Asked about declining video subscriptions, Winfrey said Charter is "becoming more and more indifferent" about small growth or losses of video customers, though having a video offering remains important to the connectivity business.

Himax will collaborate with MediaTek and facial-recognition developer Megvii on the first 3D-sensing reference design for Android smartphones using an active stereo camera. Compared with structured light technology for 3D-sensing, the ASC approach has lower cost and targets "mass market smartphone models for facial recognition, secure online payment” and artificial-intelligence-based “photo enhancement,” it said Wednesday. It promises to inspire “broader adoption” among Android smartphone makers during 2019.

There’s a “resurgence” in demand for older, cheaper “feature phones,” eating into smartphone share, reported DeviceAtlas Thursday. Google recently disclosed the U.S. is No. 2 for sub-$100 devices, “confirming there is market appetite for cheaper, less ‘smart’ phones, and making this a trend to watch,” said the report: “Feature phones released as far back as 2005 and 2009 were the most active in the US, with classic Nokia phones driving the lion's share of feature phone web traffic.”

The widescreen smartphone display trend accelerated in Q2, as devices with wide-aspect-ratio displays more than 16:9 were 45 percent of shipments, or 153 million, IHS Markit reported. LG started the trend, launching its G6 model in early 2017, the researcher said Friday. “Once considered to be a premium smartphone feature, wide displays are now featured on smartphones of all price points, from $1,000 down to $100. The increasing popularity of wide displays has broken the six-inch barrier of smartphone screens. Combined with narrow-bezel display technology, wide displays increase handset screen size, while limiting the overall smartphone dimensions.”