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In Australia, Even Private Facebook Photos Are Public

Australia's telecommunications regulator has ruled that one of the country's largest broadcasters, Channel 7, did not breach the industry code of conduct by lifting photos of deceased persons and minors from social networking site Facebook. Significantly, the regulator noted that it doesn't have the legal authority to crack down on broadcasters that lift material tagged as 'private,' looking to the Attorney General to provide some legal clarity."

Explosion at Apple supplier injures 57 workers

The welfare of Chinese workers is back in the spotlight after an explosion at Shanghai-based Riteng Computer Accessory Company left 23 people in hospital with burns and another 34 with more minor injuries. Local government officials said the explosion happened on Saturday afternoon at a workshop on the fourth floor of the facility. Riteng is a subsidiary supplier to Pegatron Corp and the Chinese newspaper Yi Cai Daily reported it was in the middle of trial production of aluminum iPad 2 back panels. A ASUS' Eee Pad Transformer Prime has already suffered a few setbacks on its march to the US market and unfortunately, it looks as if another obstacle may be on the horizon. According to a handful of tips we've received this morning, Best Buy has been sending out emails to users who pre-ordered the new tablet for delivery this week, informing them that shipments have been "back-or ...

GSM Galaxy Nexus 4.0.2 update rolls out, matches its cousin on Verizon

After the Verizon LTE Galaxy Nexus finally appeared and was (almost) immediately updated yesterday, it enjoyed the briefest of possible periods as the highest official Android version available. Now, owners of GSM-equipped Galaxy Nexus phones are getting the same bundle of tweaks shoved their way in a quick 8.7MB download. Of course, even these pure(r) Nexus phones are still slightly behind the bleeding edge represented by v4.0.3, which was Leave it to Motorola to milk the iconic RAZR branding for all it's worth. A new LTE phone has appeared in Verizon's inventory system, and dubbed the Droid RAZR MAXX, it seems to be at least a spiritual successor to the original MotoRAZR MAXX. Little else is known about the device, other than some EXIF data that hints at a similar 8 megapixel shooter. Like the variants we've seen floating around in China, could this option be sporting a 720p display? Perhaps ...

Nintendo completes 3DS Ambassador program, delivers ten GBA games to early adopters

If you've still got the 3DS price drop blues, perhaps a fresh (and final) infusion of free games will help. Early adopters that signed into the Nintendo eShop before August 11th will find ten GameBoy Advance games tacked on to their handheld's purchase history, retrievable via the same clunky redownload system that delivered the 3DS Ambassador program's NES titles. Thankfully, the unintuitive process is relatively simple -- just hop into the eShop's menu, scroll down to "Settings / Other", and select "Your Downloads," to claim y ...

NASA shows first global image taken from new satellite; Captain Planet approves

From breaking the ice on Jupiter's moon Europa to going Captain Ahab on comets, NASA's been quite busy formulating all sorts of "strategery" for future projects lately. But just because the space agency has to pay Russians to hitch a ride to space these days doesn't mean it has nothing going on in the present. Check out the first image from NASA's NPOESS Preparatory Project (NPP) satellite. The satellite launched October 28th and, eventuall ...

Sprint says it has disabled Carrier IQ on its devices

Sprint may have stood by its use of Carrier IQ on its smartphones when the furor over the software erupted a couple of weeks back -- while insisting all along that it was only used for network diagnostic purposes -- but it's now apparently had a change of heart. In a statement to Mobile Burn, Sprint says that it has "weighed customer concerns and we have disabled use of the tool so that diagnostic information and data is no longer being col ...

Listen to the Engadget Mobile Podcast, live at 5PM ET with special guest Ian Hardy!

Mobcast? Yes, yes it is. As usual, we have tons to go over this week in the Mobile Kingdom as it continues its quest for global dominance. And we'll have another special guest to add some fresh perspective; this week's honorary podcast crew member is Ian Hardy from MobileSyrup, who will join Myriam Joire, Brad Molen and Joseph Volpe at 5PM ET. And speaking of guests, please be our guests and listen in, won't you?

Note: Don't hesitate to sign up for Ustream before the show so you can join in the chat!

first dibs on Sony's next generation portable? Or maybe you imported a PlayStation Vita, and need a little help navigating the Kanji-laden menus? Either way, Sony has a bone to throw you -- an online Vita user's guide, and in English, to boot. In addition to basic console operations, the online manual details the handheld's major features and apps, including Party, Near, th ...