In other words, if you're the owner of a jailbroken phone, you should now be concerned.

Unlike the relatively innocuous iKee worm which the creator designed more as a "public service" to alert users to the potential for malware on the iPhone, the new hacker tool, dubbed "iPhone/Privacy.A," is the real deal. Where iKee simply switched the iPhone wallpaper to display a photo of singer Rick Astley (a nod to the internet meme of rickrolling), Privacy.A gives the user no indication that it is running on the device.

The new hacker tool also operates a bit differently than iKee does, as it doesn't have to sit on the iPhone itself in order to inflect its damage or spread. The hacker can either load the worm onto their personal device and then monitor the network for jailbroken devices to attack or they can load the malicious program onto a computer. As Intego points out in their post, this computer could be on a public network at an Internet cafe or retail store. In that scenario, the tool would then scan for any other jailbroken iPhones that came within range of the Wi-Fi network and attack them.

How to Secure your iPhone

Although many jailbreakers are tech-savvy enough to know how to lock down their devices to protect themselves from attack, there are quite a few who have simply followed online instructions such as these to perform the jailbreak. This group, while arguably somewhat tech-savvy, doesn't necessarily know all the nitty-gritty details about the iPhone filesystem or its security mechanisms.

To make it easy on these users, we've provided steps on how to change your iPhone's root password - the common denominator required in order for the malware to gain access to your device.

While some may argue there's no need to change your root password if you haven't also installed the SSH program, another necessary element for these attacks to work, we think that's a little short-sighted. It would be easy enough for a malicious hacker to trick jailbreakers into installing SSH by bundling it with some other third-party application offered through underground App Stores like Cydida or Icy. By masquerading as something innocent like a wallpaper-changer or ringtone bundle, a hacker could easily set up a number of jailbreakers with SSH without the victims even being aware that it has been installed. Although we haven't heard of anything like this happening yet, if we thought of it then you can bet that the hackers out there have thought of it too.

Changing the Root Password

The best protection is to simply change your iPhone root password. That will keep you safe from the current iPhone malware...as least for now. Here's how:

1. Install the MobileTerminal application from Cydia.
2. Reboot your iPhone.
3. Launch MobileTerminal and type in the command: passwd
4. At the prompt which asks for the "Old Password," type in: alpine
5. At the new password prompt, type in a new password of your choosing, making sure to pick something strong.
6. Re-enter the password to confirm.
7. You'll then be returned to the Mobile$ prompt which means the change was successful.
8. Now you'll need to change the password for the secondary admin. Type in the command login root.
9. Again, you're prompted for the old password. Type in alpine.
10. Now type in the command passwd
11. You'll then go through the change password routine a second time, entering in alpine as the old password, creating a new password and then re-entering it to confirm.
12. When you are finished, close the application.

Note: these instructions assume you are running iPhone OS 3.0 or higher.

Below we've listed 13 different tools that let you create your own iPhone applications, none of which require knowledge of Objective C, the programming language used to build apps for the iPhone OS .

What it Does: Sweb Apps offers an online service which lets anyone build their own iPhone apps even if they don't know how to code. Designed with small business owners in mind, the company offers pre-created templates which you can customize with different background images and your own custom icons if desired. Otherwise, you're welcome to use the graphics provided by the company's own image library. After picking the category for your app (Restaurant, Retail, Business, etc.), you choose the buttons you want to include (Menu, Directions, Map, etc.). You can even create a mobile storefront where Sweb Apps manages your inventory. 

How Much it Costs: The company offers four-, six- and eight-button packages, which all include a one-time set-up fee of $50 per button. Then there is a $25 monthly hosting fee applied to every application going forward

Our coverage: Build Your Own iPhone App with New Service from Sweb Apps and Sweb Apps 2.0: Build Your Own Mobile Storefront for the iPhone

2. AppIncubator

What it Does: Think you have a great idea for an iPhone app but not the skills to build it yourself. Like Apple says: "there's an app for that!" The AppIncubator iPhone App from MEDL Mobile lets you submit your ideas which the company's development team will then build into apps for you. App submissions can be sent in via the iPhone app or by way of the company website. Once received, you go online to use the company's "storyboard" tool to sketch out in more detail how you imagine the app working.

How Much it Costs: Using the service or downloading the iPhone app itself is free, but MEDL Mobile takes a cut of the profits after the app goes live in the iTunes App Store. 25% of the total revenue is shared with you and the company keeps the rest.

Our coverage: This iPhone App Helps You Make iPhone Apps

3. Kanchoo

Kanchoo is another platform that allows content producers to create native iPhone applications, this one is designed for news organizations. To use the service, you provide the company with an iPhone application icon, a splash screen (in .png format) and a description of your application which will be used in the iTunes App Store. Then, using their online tools, you build your app by uploading the content which can consist of either photos or news articles.

How Much it Costs: Basic account holders pay $88 for creation of their iPhone application and submission to the iTunes App Store along with a $28 per month fee for bandwidth and hosting.

4. AppBreeder

What it Does: AppBreeder is another DIY app builder service, similar to SwebApps. Where SwebApps offers categories to choose from, AppBreeder offers "App-Kits." These are pre-defined collections of app settings which include gadgets, icons, and behavioral elements. There are kits for a wide range of industries including everything from real estate to legal and bands to restaurants. You use the kits as a jumping off point to start building your app and then add or remove gadgets as your needs require. After building your app, you can then publish it to the iTunes App Store. However, AppBreeder isn't just limited to the iPhone - it also lets you publish apps for Blackberry and Android devices as well. (Note: the company's website says that "due to sudden demand spike" AppBreeder's build and publishing tools will be unavailable until Nov. 30th.) 

How Much it Costs: AppBreeder offers different packages depending on whether your app will be ad supported or ad-free and which platforms you plan to distribute it on. Ad supported apps are free, iPhone web apps are $9.95 - 14.95, native iPhone apps are $29.95, and the iPhone/Blackberry/Android app package is $39.95 - 49.95.

5. MyAppBuilder

What it Does: MyAppBuilder is a service that creates iPhone applications designed to help you sell your content. Whether that's books, music, videos, etc., the service turns any content into an app. You can also use MyAppBuilder to create custom quizzes, apps that are fed by Twitter pages, or you can turn your blog into an app by way of its RSS feed. To use the online app builder, you login to the service's "Control Panel" where you submit details about your app including content, features, flow, and image files. The company then uses this information to create an app for you which is sent back to you for review. After you approve the app, MyAppBuilder submits it to the iTunes App Store on your behalf.

How Much it Costs: The service is available for a fee of $29 per month. There is also a $20 processing fee to compile your data, put it in the appropriate format, and submit it to the App Store for review.

6. BuildAnApp

What it Does: BuildAnApp is another DIY cross-platform app builder designed for small businesses, community groups and professional service organizations. Using the web-based service, you can pick and choose from the company's customizable templates to create apps for the iPhone, Blackberry, or Windows Mobile platforms. As with Sweb Apps, creators can use their own graphics or choose images from the company's own online gallery. A special feature of this service is its ability to house an email distribution list that will notify end users to download the application once it becomes available. (Note: this service is currently in private beta testing right now. You can sign up here to be notified when it's available).

How Much it Costs: The company says pricing has not yet been determined but will be "competitive" with similar services.

7. eBookApp

What it Does: The eBook App Maker is a service specifically designed to create iPhone apps from eBooks. The app builder supports nearly all digital formats including PDF, Doc, Zip, CHM, HTML, TXT, FB2, PDB, PRC, Mobi, PDB, MHT, RTF. eBook creators can also specify various fonts and sizes, can add images and notes, can lock the orientation to landscape or portrait, and more.

How Much it Costs: The company's site doesn't publicly list its pricing but offers a "request a quote" form instead.

8. GameSalad

What it Does: GameSalad is a downloadable tool for creating games without needing to know programming or scripting. Using the company's visual editing software, you can create games which can then be published to both the web and to the iPhone. GameSalad offers a suite of "interactions" and attributes which you can add into your game to create the action. You can also drag-and-drop art files and sound files from your computer into the game builder, too. As you create the game, you can tweak the various elements during the building process and can preview what the game looks like before compiling it. 

How Much it Costs: The company offers a basic, free version of GameSalad which lets you publish to the web, but not the iPhone. For iPhone games, there are two versions available: the Express version for $99/year and the Pro version for $1999/year.

Our coverage: Gendai Games Launches GameSalad Beta

9. MobileRoadie

What it Does: Mobile Roadie is an application builder that lets bands create their own custom iPhone applications which can include content like photo galleries, streaming music files, YouTube videos, upcoming concert listings, lyrics, news, Twitter and RSS feeds, and even interactive features like a "wall" where fans can post comments and photos.  The app can also link to Ticketmaster and LiveNation ticket sales information and to the band's album(s) on iTunes.

How Much it Costs: There is a $499 set up fee for Mobile Roadie followed by a $29/month fee for the first 100 installs. To get rid of the 1 cent per install fee, bands can choose to host their own content instead.

10. MobBase

What it Does: Similar to Mobile Roadie, MobBase is also an app creation tool designed for bands. Without needing programming skills, musicians can create apps that include videos, images, bios, band news, streaming playlists, concert schedules and links for music purchases. The tool, offered by MixMatchMusic,

How Much it Costs: Applications are $20 dollars to activate. Free apps are priced at $15 dollars a month for the first 500 installs with $5 dollars per additional 1000 downloads. Paid apps cost $20 dollars per month for the first 500 installs and $6 dollars per month for each additional 1000. MobBase does not take any application sales fees in regards to revenue share. The company also receives 5% of purchased music downloads.

11. Rhomobile

What it Does: Rhomobile does require that you know how to code, but only HTML and Ruby, not the Objective C required for building iPhone apps. Developers can build any application and then use Rhomobile to deploy their app anywhere - including the iPhone, Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Symbian, or Android marketplaces.

How Much it Costs: The Rhodes framework is free for developers who open source their applications under GPLv3. Commercial Rhodes licenses are also available at $500 per application and commercial RhoSync server licenses are available based upon the planned number of users connected to the server.

12. PhoneGap

What it Does: Like Rhomobile above, PhoneGap is also an open source development tool for building mobile apps. Also like PhoneGap, you do need to know how to code, but this time, you just need to know HTML and Java as opposed to the iPhone's Objective C. With this tool, you can build apps for iPhone, Blackberry, and Android while also taking advantage of the phones' native features like geolocation, the accelerometer, sound and more.

How Much it Costs: PhoneGap is completely open source and free to use.

Our coverage: PhoneGap: People's Choice Winner at Web 2.0 Expo Launch Pad

13. RedLaser

What it Does: Red Laser is an iPhone application that lets you scan barcodes with your iPhone in order to compare the in-store price with other online deals. However, with the latest version of the application, RedLaser 2.2, you can create your own custom barcode scanning apps. To do so, first download the updated application from the iTunes App Store, then visit www.redlaser.com/apps from the iPhone's web browser. Follow the instructions on the page to set up your own application - you'll need to fill in data like the URL of the site you want to compare prices with, the URL for the app icon, etc. When complete, tap the "build app" button. The completed app can then be added to your homescreen. Although this app is designed more for personal use and not resale, it's still worth checking out if you want to create your own barcode scanning application without needing to know how to code.

How Much it Costs: RedLaser is available on the iTunes App Store for $1.99.

Update!

While this post was by no means meant to be a definitive list, it's amazing the response it's received in both the comments and via email. So many people have asked "how could you forget.. this company or that?" OK, Appcelerator was an oversight, but as far as the others, they just weren't on my radar. Here's a few of the ones that received multiple mentions:

• TapLynx: A DIY solution for building apps without coding.
• MobileAppLoader: Another DIY solution for building iPhone apps without code.
• MobileStoreMaker: A DIY solution for making a mobile storefront for iPhone.
• Appcelerator: Like Rhomobile and PhoneGap, you do need to code, but you don't need to know Objective C. Instead, you can build iPhone apps with HTML, JavaScript, CSS, Python, PHP and Ruby instead.

• MobiOne: An iPhone emulator that lets you build iPhone apps by coding them using your web development skills.
• Appanda: A system that lets you build apps through RSS, links and manual uploads. Still in beta.

However, there are tons of others, too. Really - tons! Hop into the comments section to see even more suggestions from their users and fans.

Called simply Facebook Keyboard Navigation, the tool requires the Firefox plug-in Greasemonkey - a powerful browser customization tool you can learn to make even more advanced use of in 5 minutes.

There are 15 keystroke shortcuts out of the box, but by going through your Firefox menus Toolkits, Greasemonkey, manage scripts then select that script and hit edit - then you can make some additional customization. It's a remarkably simple script, just look at the format in the file and either change or add to it in the same way.

I assigned the letter "R" to jump to my Facebook list of "real friends" by grabbing the part of that list's URL that follows facebook.com, pasting it into the edited script and saving. I then had to reload Facebook but sure enough, it works great.

Once you've done that, try the Facebook Fixer script. These are all remarkably easy to use and they make life so much better!

Jailbreaking and unlocking the iPhone are two different hacks which allow you to take control of your mobile device in different ways. Jailbreaking is a type of hack that lets you install unapproved third-party applications on your iPhone or iPod Touch from searchable repositories provided by apps like Cydia and Icy. Unlocking, on the other hand, is a hack that lets you use your iPhone on another cellular network. Here in the U.S., that means you can use the iPhone on T-Mobile instead of AT&T. You have to first jailbreak your phone before you can unlock it, but you don't have to unlock a phone in order to jailbreak it.

Unfortunately, what was once a relatively simple process has gotten more complex over time as new iPhone models were introduced and new hacking tools were being put out by multiple parties, often with confusing names like Pwnage Tool, Purplesn0w and redsn0w. With each release of iPhone firmware, it seems as if there's a whole new lexicon of terms to master and new procedures to follow. The 3.1.2 jailbreak is no exception. However, this jailbreak works on all versions of the iPhone and even on the latest iPod Touch.

How to Jailbreak the 3.1.2 Firmware (Windows Instructions)

Before beginning this jailbreak, keep in mind that this is for jailbreakers only - not unlockers. That means if you're currently using your phone on a non-standard carrier (for example, in the U.S. you're using T-Mobile instead of AT&T), then you do NOT want to use this tool because it will disable the unlock.

But if you're just interested in jailbreaking, read on:

1. Update to 3.1.2: If you haven't done so already, download the latest version of iTunes. Next, update your iPhone to the latest firmware when you're prompted to do so (click "Download and Install" on the pop-up message). Allow the new firmware to install as you would normally. This will un-jailbreak your phone for the time being.

   

2. Get the jailbreak tool: To get started with the newest jailbreak, Windows users should head to http://blackra1n.com. and click on the window icon at the bottom of the page to download the executable.
3. Run blackra1n: After the download is complete, connect your iPhone to your PC and run the executable. Click the "make it ra1n" button and the message will display "entering recovery..." (Note: Vista and Windows 7 users should run it in compatibility mode and as "Administrator." Right-click on the file, go to Properties, then click the "Compatibility" tab. Check the "run this program in compatibility mode for:" checkbox and choose Windows XP Service Pack 2 from the list provided. Click "OK" to close the window. Right-click to run as the Administrator.)

   

   

4. Device reboots: Continue letting the program run, the message now reads "running..." and after you see the image of geohot's face (the same as seen here), the device will reboot. A pop-up message will display prompting you to donate if you can. Click "OK" to close this message.
5. Launch blackra1n on the iPhone: On your iPhone, look for the blackra1n icon and tap it to launch the program.
6. Pick your favorite installer program: On the screen that appears, you have a choice between installer programs (repositories of jailbreak apps). Tap the one you prefer - Cydia, Rock or Icy - any will do. Blackra1n will install your chosen program on your phone and will relaunch the iPhone springboard when complete. Your phone is now jailbroken, and you can use Cydia, Rock or Icy to browse, search for and install jailbreak apps.

Tips: If the Upgrade is Stuck at "Running," Try the Following:

• Set airplane mode on.
• Move blackra1n to the C:\ drive and run it from there.
• Kill any iTunes-related services prior to running.
• While it's stuck on "running," do a hard reboot (push the home and power buttons simultaneously). The app will display a message that says it's done jailbreaking, but it's not. With the USB cable still plugged in, re-run the blackra1n app. This time it should work.

However, be aware that the blackra1n jailbreak is still a little iffy for some users. Several people have reported that they're unable to jailbreak, despite following instructions. If you're not feeling adventurous, you may want to wait for the Dev Team's jailbreak instead.

Mac Users Have to Wait

Sorry Mac users, there is no jailbreak yet available for 3.1.2 just yet. However, you can use the Pwnage Tool to jailbreak older 3.1 versions of the iPhone firmware. More details are here.

Update 10/14/09: The iPhone Dev Team has now released a Mac tool for jailbreaking 3.1.2. More details are here.

Many people are only just coming to know the newer services like Posterous, so in this post we give you 5 tips to get the most out of them. The post is in the same vein as our earlier How to use Facebook one.

Blogging started out in the early days as a text-heavy medium; and to this day professional blogs (such as ReadWriteWeb) rely mostly on text. But the whole point of light blogging - sometimes called micro-blogging - is to be more casual and colorful. So post lots of media: photos, video, audio. Most light blogging services offer a browser bookmarklet, which enables you to post media at the click of a button.

Here's an example of easily published media from a Posterous blog called ReflectionOf.Me:

2. Subscribe to Other People (& Re-Blog)

One thing that hasn't changed about blogging is the sense of community. Half the fun of maintaining a blog is reaching out to your network. So be proactive in finding people who blog about similar things as you, then link to them and even re-blog their posts (copy and paste - it's much more accepted in light blogging than in professional blogging!).

At this stage, the market leader Tumblr still offers you the best chance of finding like-minded souls - due to the sheer number of people using it. Here's an example of community from a Tumblr user called rudie. Note the "following" panel on the right, which lists the other blogs that rudie follows.

3. Aggregate Content From Your Other Apps

With light blogging, you needn't even spend time actually blogging - because you can pull in content automatically from other apps. While FriendFeed and even Facebook are common methods for many of us to aggregate our content from across the web (a.k.a. 'lifestreaming'), it's just as easy to do so using Tumblr, Posterous or Soup.io.

To the right is an example from my own Soup.io blog. Every week Soup.io polls last.fm and automatically publishes the top 5 artists I've listened to in the past week.

4. Customize Your Theme

All of the leading light blogging services offer a variety of colorful themes. If you're handy with HTML and/or CSS, you can customize your template too - if you want to make it unique. Here's a cool MySpace-esque design from Tumblr user Juice in a Box:

5. Don't Take it Seriously

It's not called light blogging for nothing (actually it wasn't called light blogging at all, until we clumsily coined it!). Services such as Tumblr, Posterous and Soup.io make it very easy to experiment with blogging, have fun, see new things, meet new people. Why not give it go...

From Sween's Tumblr blog

SageCircle has been maintaining a list of tech analysts with Twitter accounts and the list is now up to 724 active users. It's a cool list and I thought it would be a good thing to put into TweepML, a wonderful Twitter group-creation service we reviewed earlier this month. The link for following all the analysts is below.

Then at the top of the page you'll see a bit.ly link to part 2. With three clicks of your mouse you can add the daily minute wisdom of 724 tech analysts to your life. It takes awhile for the system to add all of your new friends, and at one point I got a message that my Twitter account was temporarily suspended - but that didn't turn out to be true. That said, open this magic box of wisdom at your own risk.

Think this sounds like a bad idea? Not if you believe that online noise is good for you or you know how to use the secret weapon of the social web, effective and strategic creation of groups.

Thanks a bunch to Carter Lusher of SageCircle, @carterlusher, for building and maintaining this list.

Want to do something to help, yourself? Go create a new Twitter account, follow all these people, then follow these instructions to create an OPML file of all the analysts' feeds using Dave Winer's tool for that. Then, upload that OPML file to Google Reader and you'll be able to search through the history of these analysts' tweets, in some cases as far as 2 or 3 years back! Then post that OPML file somewhere, or send it to me, so I can share it with everyone else reading this.

What would you do with 724 new analyst friends on Twitter? I'm going to spend some time with a text file of all the usernames and a Tweetdeck column. It sure would be nice if Tweetdeck supported bulk import and export of groups.

In an interview yesterday, in preparation for the ReadWrite Real-Time Web Summit, John Borthwick of Betaworks (a Tweetdeck investor) said that interoperability and innovation based on groups are something the team is working on. I think this group of analysts on Twitter is just one of many examples of value that can be derived from group creation.

But what can be done? It's not like you can just quit Facebook, right? No - and you don't have to either. You just need to take a few precautions.

The problem in implementing these privacy options is that they're just too confusing for most non-tech savvy people to handle. And often, folks don't want to bother to take the time to learn. To simplify the process, we're offering five easy steps you can take today to help make your Facebook experience safer, more secure, and more private.

Step 1: Make Friend Lists

Yes, it will take some time, especially if you're connected to a couple hundred friends already. But this step, while not the quickest, is fairly simple. And it will be one of the most useful things you can do on Facebook.

Friend lists, like they sound, are lists for categorizing your friends into various groups. The nice thing about this feature is that once you set these lists up, you won't have to do it again. We suggest that you put your work colleagues and professional acquaintances into a friend list designated "work," personal friends you're not very close with into a list called "Acquaintances," and people you're related to into a list called "Family." Those three main categories will separate out the groups of "friends" who you may want to hide some information from.

To create a friend list, click on "Friends" at the top of the Facebook homepage. In the left-hand column, click "Friends" again under the "Lists" section. Now you'll see a button at the top that says "Create New List". Click it. In the pop-up that appears, you can name your list and pick members. If you've ever shared an application with your friends, the process of doing this will be very familiar.

When you've finished making lists, you'll be able to use them when selecting who can see what (or who can't!) when configuring the security settings described below.

Step 2: Who Can See What on Your Profile

At the top right of Facebook, there's a menu that many people probably ignore: "Settings." But this menu is now going to become your best friend. To get started, hover your mouse over the Settings menu and click "Privacy Settings" from the list that appears. On the next page, click "Profile." This takes you to a page where you can configure who gets to see certain information on your profile.

Before making changes, think carefully about the sorts of things you want public and the things you want private. Should "everyone" get to see photos you're tagged in? Or would you like to limit this only to those you've specifically chosen as Facebook friends?

Underneath each section on this page (basic info, personal info, status, etc.), you can designate who gets to see that particular bit of information. For anyone not using custom lists (see step 1), the best thing to enter here is "Only Friends." Anything else opens up your profile information to people you may or may not know. For example, choosing "Everyone" makes that info public, "Friends of Friends" lets your friends' friends see it, "My Networks and Friends" opens up your info to anyone in your networks - that means anyone in your city, your high school, your college, a professional organization you listed, etc.

You can also block certain groups from seeing these sections, too. On any item that offers an "Edit Custom Settings" option, you can click that link to display a pop-up box where you can choose people or lists to block (see where it says "Except these people"). If you haven't made custom lists as explained in step 1 above, you can enter individual names here instead. (Sorry, mom, dad, boss - this is where you get blocked.)

Step 3: Who Can See Your Address and Phone Number

Did you list your address and phone number on Facebook? While that's a handy feature, you may not want everyone you friended to have this information. To access this configuration page, you follow the same steps as above in step 2 to display the Profile Privacy page. You'll notice that the page has two tabs at the top - click on the one that reads "Contact information."

As previously described above, you can again use the drop-down lists provided to designate who gets to see what and/or block certain people or lists from viewing this information. The sections on this page include "IM Screen Name," "Mobile Phone," "Other Phone," "Current Address," "Website," and your email.

Step 4: Change Who Can Find You on Facebook via Search

Sick of getting friend requests from old high school pals? While for some the beauty of Facebook is that it lets you reconnect with everyone you ever knew throughout your life, others find this intrusive and annoying. You're not friends with any of these people anymore for a reason, right?

As it turns out, you can still enjoy Facebook without some folks ever knowing or finding you thanks to the search privacy settings.

Click on the "Settings" menu on Facebook's homepage and then click "Search" on the following page. You'll be taken to a Search Privacy page where you can specify who gets to find you on Facebook. Want to be wide open? Change the "Search Visibility" drop-down box to "Everyone." Want to keep it a little more limited? Select "My Networks and Friends," "Friends of Friends," or "My Networks and Friends of Friends" instead. Don't want anyone finding you on Facebook? Change it to "Only Friends." That means only the people who you've already friended can find you in a Facebook search.

On this page, you can also configure what information displays when your info is returned as a search result (e.g. your profile picture, your friend list, etc.). In addition, you can check and uncheck the boxes for network-based searches too. For example, if you don't want anyone from high school to find you, uncheck the box next to "people in high school networks."

Step 5: Stop Sharing Personal Info with Unknown Applications

Remember when we told you about what Facebook quizzes know about you? Using Facebook's default settings, you're unknowingly sharing a plethora of personal information (and your friends' info too!) with various Facebook applications and the developers who created them. The problem is so bad that the ACLU recently created their own Facebook Quiz to demonstrate how much information an app has access to.

It's time to take back control! From the Facebook homepage, hover your mouse over the "Settings" menu and choose "Privacy Settings" from the drop-down list. On the next page, click "Applications" then click the tab that reads "Settings" which is next to the "Overview" tab. (Oh, and if you want to really be freaked out, read that overview!)

On this page, you can check and uncheck boxes next to your personal information (picture, education history, wall, religious views, etc.). This controls what the applications your friends are using can see about you. Yes, your friends' apps can see your personal info if you don't make this change! Believe it or not, you don't have the same control over your own apps. The best you can do is head over to the Applications page and delete the apps you're not using anymore. (Use the "X" to remove them.) You see, once you authorize an application, you're telling it that it's OK to access any information associated with your account that it requires to work. While some developers may only pull what's actually required, many others just pull in everything they can. Scary, isn't it?

Conclusion

While this is by no means a comprehensive guide to Facebook security and privacy, these five steps can help you get started in creating a safer, more secure, and more private environment on the social network.

However, if you choose not to take any precautions, then you'll only have yourself to blame when an errant wall post or naughty photo makes its way online and straight into Grandma's News Feed, or worse, your boss's. These days, it's better to be safe than sorry, so go ahead and delve into those settings!

Unfortunately, there seemed to be a problem with the new security feature: it wasn't working...or at least, so it seemed. As it turns out, the problem was that users weren't informed as to how to properly activate the anti-phishing protection, an issue that points to a poor implementation of what could and should have been a major breakthrough in mobile computing technology.

Although Apple touted the anti-phishing protection back in March when they announced their 3.0 update, the new feature didn't actually materialize until this month when the company released the OS 3.1 iPhone/iPod Touch software. According to Apple, the anti-phishing protection feature will display an on-screen warning message when you attempt to visit a known malicious website.

Once the update was released, security researchers and other Apple enthusiasts began testing the new technology. The results were immediately disappointing. "I've not been able to get it to block anything," Michael Sutton, vice president of research at security firm Zscaler was quoted as saying. He had been testing the feature using known phishing websites identified by the anti-phishing database hosted at PhishTank. The Mac Security Blog also found after extensive testing that it simply "does not seem to work." MacWorld, however, found that the feature worked sometimes, but the inconsistency hinted that the technology was not "ready for public consumption," they reported.

What gives? Did Apple really release a broken feature? Were they even aware of the problem? Blogger Jim Dalrymple of The Loop decided to go straight to the source: he asked Apple.

Apple Says "You're Doing it Wrong"

Apparently, this was not a case of the anti-phishing technology being broken. It was a case of everyone simply "doing it wrong." As it turns out, in order for Safari's anti-phishing database to update, there are a few particular steps that need to be followed, explained an Apple spokesperson. After updating the phone to the OS 3.1 update, users need to do the following:

1. Launch the Safari web browser.
2. Connect to a Wi-Fi network.
3. Charge the iPhone with the screen off.

The spokesperson added that for "most users" this process should happen automatically when they charge their phone. We would have to disagree. "Most users" don't launch the Safari browser prior to charging their device - if anything, they close down any open applications before plugging in the phone to charge.

Poorly Implemented, Poorly Explained

If you follow the above steps, the feature will work. However, most users will never know to do this unless they happen to closely follow technology news and blogs. The general mainstream population - the very demographic Apple so craftily attracts via their billion dollar marketing campaigns - expects things to "just work." That is the Apple promise, after all.

Yet even on Apple's own website where they detail the various new features in the OS 3.1 update, there is no mention as to how the anti-phishing protection should be utilized. It simply lists that the feature exists. A helpful link to a "how to" guide would seem appropriate here or, at the very least, a footnote.

Having to perform the somewhat unintuitive steps to get the anti-phishing protection feature to function properly seems like an unusual miss for a company who generally makes things simple and straightforward. Why does it need Wi-Fi, for example? Apple claims that the Wi-Fi connectivity is required so as not to incur any additional data fees for the end user. But launching the browser? We almost wonder if it wouldn't have made better sense for Apple to implement the feature in the new iTunes update instead. The desktop software could retrieve the updated anti-phishing database from the internet upon launch and could then sync it to the iPhone or iPod Touch the next time it was plugged in. That would also alleviate another common problem with the current implementation - if the phone isn't plugged in long enough, the update won't complete and users will only be partially protected. On the other hand, the inclusion of the database via a sync would have ensured that all the data was copied over to the phone.

In the end, though, Graham Cluley, a senior technology consultant at Sophos, reminds us that maybe we shouldn't be too hard on Apple. "Many other smartphones don't offer even the most elementary form of anti-phishing protection to their users," he says. That may be true but, unfortunately, the way Apple chose to deliver their anti-phishing protection feature means that most iPhone users won't be protected either.

That means you can now subscribe to an RSS feed showing you who likes your Tweets, even if they didn't reply, retweet or respond otherwise. That's interesting information to know.

Right now the feed doesn't display the usernames of the people who favorited your tweets, you'll have to click through a notification to visit the Favstar site to see that. The site's creator wants to give people a reason to come back, and that makes sense, but I sure would like to see those usernames in the feed.

I've put my Favstar feed into my favorite RSS to IM alert system, just because I think that's where it will work best for me. I might put it someplace else later, but I sure am glad to have it; it's nice to know who likes your Tweets.

Why is this useful? Well, I had no idea that widely respected PR pro Constantin Basturea was thinking about me until Favstar showed me that he favorited one of my recent tweets. We haven't exchanged words in months - but his thinking of me makes me think about him. I know now that I could reach out to him about the subject of that tweet or some other matter and I'd already have a place somewhere toward the front of his mind.

If it's funny Tweets you're looking for, make sure to visit the amazing automated funniest Tweet finder Favrd, too. Favstar, though, has something for everyone who's ever been favorited at all. Now with RSS it can become a regular part of your social media monitoring, instead of just a fun one-off thing you check once and forget about.

Now you can annotate images from Wikimedia Commons in a fashion very similar to Flickr. The big difference with the new feature is that annotations can be added by anyone, and no account is necessary. While they don't show up directly in Wikipedia yet, a new version of the system that will appear in the free encyclopedia is under development.

Once you find the image you want, either by clicking through from Wikipedia or searching Wikimedia Commons directly, just click the "add note" button underneath any image on its own page. Then type in your text and either preview or save it. In addition to simple text notes, you can include wiki markup to add links or for styling, and if your annotation fails then you can add it manually through editing the page's code.

The image annotation gadget is basically just some JavaScript written by a Wikimedia volunteer and made standard on the site. If you're a regular user and you don't like the boxes showing up on your images, then you can turn it off via your user preferences. The advantage to logging in to add notes is that a history of all your annotations will show up in your user contributions history. According to the project's FAQ, a version will soon be available for use directly within Wikipedia.

Having said that, there's no doubt that Facebook is a powerful social networking tool. So how can you best utilize it and find the good apps? In this post we aim to find out. We'll be focusing specifically on social activities, rather than the many other potential uses of Facebook (work, brand management, etc).

This is a simple thing to do to keep your Facebook profile active. Right at the top of the page there is a place where you can "write something." Usually a comment about what you're doing or thinking. Once a day, or even once every few days, is enough. But update it enough to keep your page interesting.

Tip 2. Use Groups (a.k.a. Lists in Facebook Terminology)

Groups are a core feature of social networking on the Web. To effectively use Facebook, we recommend you set up some groups so that you can filter content. One person who does this very well is our own Marshall Kirkpatrick. Marshall says that he generally scans his Facebook homepage first, then clicks to his groups for family and old friends from school. He noted that "this way most of my time spent on Facebook isn't re-reading the same things I've already read on Twitter."

There is a bit of a trick to setting this groups feature up. Facebook calls this feature "lists," probably to differentiate them from its other Groups feature (which have been usurped by 'Pages' now). Confused? Get used to it, Facebook navigation is awful.

To set lists up for your Facebook account, go to your Facebook homepage and click the "more" link on the left-hand sidebar. You will see a link entitled "Create new list" at the bottom - click on that to create a new group.

Tip 3: Add Your Content From Other Sources (Carefully...)

In this day and age, you are likely creating content in more than a few places on the Web. This ranges from the extreme cases (early adopters who have personal RSS feeds coming out their ears), to those who may just use YouTube and a couple of other niche social websites.

Many early adopters use FriendFeed to aggregate their 'lifestream' of content from multiple sources. Facebook just bought FriendFeed, so expect to see it integrated into Facebook over time. As of now, if you have more than a few content sources and they aren't necessarily the well-known ones like YouTube or Last.fm, then you'll need to use FriendFeed or an equivalent lifestreaming product to aggregate those feeds. But if you find FriendFeed just a bit too geeky (and many people do), then you can adequately enrich your Facebook profile with external content.

One thing we'd caution, which this author took too long to notice: don't pipe your FriendFeed content into Facebook if you aggregate a lot of content into FriendFeed! It quickly overpowers your Wall and will likely annoy the friends you have who also subscribe to your FriendFeed.

To add external content to Facebook, on your Wall page click the 'Options' link on the top right. Then click 'Settings.'

You can then choose to "import stories" to your Facebook wall from a select number of sites: Flickr, Digg, YouTube and others.

You can add content from other external sources to Facebook by clicking the 'application settings page' link further down the page.

Tip 4: Brighten Up Your Profile With Photos and Videos

This almost goes without saying, but adding multimedia makes your Facebook profile interesting and attractive.

If instead of Facebook you usually use a specialist photo site (like Flickr) or video site (like Vimeo), then you'll need to search around for ways to export your files. I use Flickr and didn't find a satisfactory way to export photos from Flickr to Facebook's Photo albums. But via my Twitter network I managed to discovered a plug-in for iPhoto, which allows Mac users to bulk export from iPhoto to Facebook.

Tip 5: Search Out the Best Facebook Apps

Ever since Facebook became a development platform back in May 2007, thousands of apps have been built to add to your Facebook page. As noted in the introduction, these range from trivial (e.g. sheep throwing) to very useful. The best tip here is to find apps that complement your interests.

Our advice is to search the directory for keywords of interest to you. The quality of apps varies greatly and often there are errors (at least I came across them several times when researching this article). When you find an app you like, you can add it to your profile. I added an Art app recently, for example.

You can browse a user's apps by clicking the oddly-named 'Boxes' tab on their profile page.

Tell Us How You Use Facebook!

We hope this post inspires you to spruce up your Facebook page a bit. For more tips, check out Facebook's own Influencers page.

Let us know in the comments what tips you have, or what you use Facebook for every day!

Twitter's search engine only goes back about a week and a half. Sometimes you want to retrieve a message you saw, or get a feeling for what your circle of friends said about something, from longer ago than that. We wrote yesterday about 10 Ways To Archive Your Tweets. The next step is to archive the Tweets of everyone else you find of interest, and make them searchable.

OPML stands for Outline Processor Markup Language and in this case it's just a bundle of RSS feeds than can be moved around in bulk. It's a beautiful idea that has a lot more potential than has been realized, but you'll see how it comes in handy here.

It's all about pulling down an OPML file of your Twitter friends' feeds and slapping that file into Google Reader. Then it's archived and searchable. It's very easy to do.

How to Make it Happen

It couldn't be much simpler. Just put your Twitter username into this link, instead of mine, and load it up in your browser: http://tw.opml.org/get?user=marshallk&folder=1

It may take just a minute, but the end result will be an OPML file. You can either go up to your browser's File menu and select "save as" or you can View Source and copy and paste the source of the page into a text document. Save it with a memorable name and either .xml or .opml as the file type. It's really quite easy.

Now if you want to put this puppy into Google Reader just log in, click on "manage subscriptions" and find the import/export button. Import that file into Google Reader and you're ready to rock and roll!

Update: The combination of interest from this post and the limitations of Twitter's API has caused a temporary challenge for this service and Winer says he's had to limit friend extractions to 1,000 per user for now. Give it a go, but bookmark it for later when there's less of a rush and it can be less of a proof of concept.

What Can You Do With This?

Do you want to read Tweets through Google Reader? Probably not. But do you want to archive, retrieve and search that way? It works remarkably well! Especially because of the social nature of Google Reader. If anyone you're following has had their RSS feed read by anyone in Google Reader, ever, the system will have an archive of their tweets that goes far beyond what's immediately available in their RSS feed right now. Thus my ability to pull up tweets from two years ago in a search.

You may want to create a separate Google Reader account for this (I did) so the Tweets don't clutter up other feeds you like to read.

There are certainly other little things you can do with easy OPML files of Twitter followers as well. You can't import them directly into Twitter clients (yet) but you can share and trade them into an RSS reader as a preview mechanism before deciding to subscribe in Twitter proper. (My favorite tech analysts on Twitter, informative LGBT activists on Twitter, etc. in OPML format - collect 'em all!)

These are the kinds of things that make simple protocols for dynamic information delivery, like RSS and OPML, so much fun.

You could create and share OPML files of your favorite twitter users concerning a particular topic. You could build an OPML file of a group of twitter users and have their RSS feeds automatically displayed on a page on your website.

You could assemble different groups of people into different OPML files, saved in different folders in your Google Reader account, and then limit searches to one folder or another in order to get a sampling of what various groups of people have to say about a topic. That would be hot!

The possibilities are endless, but the most basic use cases of archiving and search are already worth doing. We'd love to know how you can imagine using tools like this together.

Caveats

It's not clear how quickly Google Reader is updating its record of tweets and it is definitely missing a lot. We searched for some specific twitter messages from several months ago from people whose Tweets are being subscribed to in Google Reader, but that it didn't retrieve. I hope that won't happen with user feeds I've subscribed to myself now, but take it with a grain of salt. Google Reader isn't really a terribly serious product, anyway. It could come in quite handy, but there is a larger value here in getting your hands on an OPML file of your Twitter friends' messages.

How can you imagine putting an OPML file like this to use?

You can find ReadWriteWeb on Twitter, as well as the entire RWW Team. Please follow: Marshall Kirkpatrick, Bernard Lunn, Alex Iskold, Sarah Perez, Frederic Lardinois, Jolie Odell, Dana Oshiro, Steven Walling and Lidija Davis.

What that means is something tweeted prior to a week and a half ago can never be retrieved via search.twitter.com. That's bad for users and it's definitely bad for data-mining. Unless Twitter corrects this issue on its own, we have to find another solution for archiving tweets ourselves. Here are 10 ways to do so.

1. The Archivist: A Desktop Tool for Archiving Searches

The Archivist is a Windows desktop software application built by members of Microsoft's Mix Online team. With this program, you can create Twitter searches which will then be archived to your PC so they can be data-mined by you at a later date. Recently, the program was updated so that it can be minimized to the system tray - especially helpful for when you want to track a Twitter search over a long period of time. They also added a data visualization feature which calculates who's tweeting the most about your topic.

2. Twapper Keeper: Archive Tweets Based on Hashtags

Twapper Keeper is an online tool which archives tweets based on a given hashtag. Once you set up a query, Twapper Keeper will periodically scan Twitter for that tag and then archive the tweets it finds on its own servers. Tweets are scanned approximately every 5 minutes but that can vary based on the velocity of the incoming tweets. Once archived, you can then organize the tweets into categories of your choosing which show up on the right-hand side of the archived page.

3. Twitter Tools: Archive Tweets in WordPress

Twitter Tools is a WordPress blog plugin which integrates your blog and Twitter account. Once installed and configured, the plugin can be used to both Twitter links to your blog and to create posts which contain your recent tweets. While this is handy for the WordPress blog owner, keep in mind that post after post of "Today's Tweets" isn't all that appealing to blog readers. You may want to create a separate blog for this if you intend to use WordPress as your own personal Twitter archive.

4. Twistory: Tweets in Your Calendar

Twistory is a service which lets you add your Twitter backlog feed to your favorite calendar application. The service lets you subscribe to any user's Twitter RSS feed which can then be integrated into a calendaring application like Google Calendar, Outlook, Thunderbird, or any other application that supports the iCal format. Tweets are added immediately to the calendar upon posting and the service can even import almost all the way back to your first tweet ever.

5. SweetCron, AmpliFeeder, or Storytlr: A Lifestream of Tweets

We reviewed SweetCron back nearly a year ago when it first launched. Essentially, this self-hosted lifestreaming application lets you create your own customizable version of a FriendFeed-like service, but one that's hosted on your own server. The software is installed on a server with PHP and MySQL running on it and then must be configured with the social media sites you want to aggregate. Of course, one of the sites you can pull in is Twitter.

AmpliFeeder works the same way and includes a number of themes to choose from. This service can also generate XML files which can be used to backup all your social streams' data, too. Recently, Amplifeeder launched their hosted version of the service (get started here), but unfortunately, it relies on FriendFeed to import your lifestream. And who knows how long that will be around.

Storytlr is a third option for creating a lifestream at your own custom URL. However, it's doesn't just function as an aggregator - it also lets you post your own, unique content too. (Our review).

6. Twinbox: Tweets in Your Outlook

TwInbox is an Outlook plugin which lets you receive your friends' updates directly in your Outlook inbox. With this plugin activated, you can search, archive, and group your tweets the same way you manage your email. You can also update your Twitter status from Outlook or retrieve tweets based on keyword searches. Of course, if you're in a corporate environment, your I.T. admin may enforce mailbox size limits which means you'll have to archive your "tweets" folder more often than you'd like to keep your PST/OST to a manageable size.

7. RSS Feeds

One of the simplest ways to archive tweets is to simply grab the RSS feed for your tweet stream of choice and add it to your preferred RSS reader. If you use Google Reader, for example, the service's "infinite scrolling" feature lets you go back to the very first item ever tracked for that subscription. Plus, Reader has a search box at the top for searching for keywords or phrases in your feeds which will also help you rediscover older tweets. (Update! See our post "How to Backup and Search All Your Friends Tweets in Google Reader" for how-to instructions on using RSS as a backup method.)

8. Tweetake, TweetDumpr, Tweetscan, BackupMyTweets, TweetBackup: Twitter Backup Tools

Tweetake is a third-party service which lets you back up your Twitter account including tweets, DMs, followers, friends, and favorites. However, Tweetake is limited to backing up only the first 1000 contacts and there's no way to re-import the data into Twitter at the moment. It's mainly used as a personal archive of data which you can store for safe-keeping. TweetDumpr is a similar service but only focuses on backing up the tweets themselves from public timelines. Tweetscan also lets you download your Twitter message archive including replies to a CSV file. BackupMyTweets and TweetBackup are yet two more Twitter backup services which lets you backup your tweets daily.

9. Archive Tweets with Evernote

The popular note-taking application Evernote offers a feature which lets you send your public Twitter messages and private DMs right into Evernote where they can be searched and stored permanently. Unfortunately, in order for this service to work, you have to put "@myEN" into the body of any public tweet, making it less-than-ideal for archiving your every missive. Instead, this is a good way to archive select tweets you wouldn't want to lose.

10. Geek Tools Let You Archive in XML, PDF, HTML, TXT...or even with Python

RSS guru Dave Winer released a tool earlier this year which archives Twitter posts using the OPML Editor and optionally synchronizes with a structure on Amazon S3. Alternately, there's this simple Python script for archiving tweets. Sourceforge also hosts an app with lets you backup up tweets of different users as XML, HTML, PDF, or TXT. However, it can only perform backups of 3200 tweets at a time. Each subsequent backup will append the additional tweets to the current existing archive.

Luckily for jailbreakers, problems like those above are less of an issue. There's currently an open source Spotify client app available for download and the third-party GV Mobile app for Google Voice is coming soon.

Like the official Spotify iPhone client, the third party client app called Spot, available from Cydia, also requires a Premium account in order to work. Also like the official app, Spot lets you search for songs and build playlists. However, where the official client will let you cache playlists to listen to when the AT&T network fails or you lose your connection, the Spot application has yet to implement this type of feature according to a forum posting. That's a big drawback, unfortunately, since the caching ability is precisely what makes Spotify feel less like a streaming service and more like a real iTunes alternative.

There's also another major issue for jailbreakers here in the U.S. looking to get on board with Spotify - the premium account. In order to run Spot, you need a premium account to sign into the app. However, in order to get a premium account, you have to sign up at Spotify.com, a site which currently prevents you from doing so because Spotify is not available in this country yet. So what good is an open source app if you don't have a premium account, right?

Fortunately, there are a few workarounds for this issue. For one, you could access the Spotify web site using a UK-based (or other European country-based) proxy server. A quick Google search presented us with several options for doing so, although we won't point to any exact resources since this isn't exactly the most legal way of going about things. Let's just say this: we got to the sign up page and it was only a matter of putting in our name and account details.

Another option is to purchase an account from an overseas friend who has access to the service in their country. Have them purchase the account and you pay them back after they give you the username/password. (Obviously, you'd want to go with a real friend you trust here, not some random stranger from the internet.)

Either way, getting access to Spotify via Spot is a bit more difficult than we hoped it would be, but it's not impossible if you're really motivated.

GV Mobile Coming to Cydia

Although there aren't any Google Voice alternatives available just yet, we hear that one in particular is coming soon. The third-party client application GV Mobile was among the Google Voice apps just pulled from the App Store. According to a tweet from the developer Sean Kovacs, he plans to upload the latest version of the application to Cydia ("or similar"...perhaps referring to Icy) soon. You may want to follow his Twitter account for more details as to when that occurs.

For more details on jailbreaking, check out our how-to guide here.

Now it seems Hotz is at it again. Although this time around he's not first, he is claiming that his new software, "purplesn0w," is a better unlocking tool for the iPhone 3GS than what the Dev Team has put out.

Unlocking vs Jailbreaking

In case you're unfamiliar, jailbreaking and unlocking are two entirely different things. Jailbreaking is simply a type of hack that lets you install unapproved third-party applications on your iPhone or iPod Touch from searchable repositories provided by apps like Cydia and Icy. Unlocking, on the other hand, is a hack that lets you use your iPhone on another cellular network. Here in the U.S., that means you can use the iPhone on T-Mobile instead of AT&T. You have to first jailbreak your phone before you can unlock it, but you don't have to unlock a phone in order to jailbreak it.

How to Unlock Your iPhone 3GS in 4 Steps

In order to unlock your iPhone 3GS to work on another carrier's network, you have to first jailbreak your phone. The instructions below assume you have already done so. Because jailbreaking is a more involved process, we won't document it in this post. (Note: you can read our online guide "how to jailbreak your iPhone to OS 3.0" to jailbreak your phone).

In this case you'll want to use the software "purplera1n" to perform the jailbreak before using purplesn0w.

As always, it's a good idea to have a current iPhone backup in place in case something goes horribly, horribly wrong and you have to restore your device to factory settings.

Also note that at the present time, your phone will have to already be activated in order for this unlock to work. However, it sounds like a "hacktivation" is in the works -meaning that, in the future, you won't need to officially activate your phone with AT&T (or your country's default carrier) first.

1. Disable 3G: Go into "Settings," "General," "Network," and then tap the slider that reads "Enable 3G" to set it to the OFF position. Exit back to the main screen when finished.
2. Add the Geohot Repository to Cydia: Again, since you've already jailbroken your phone, you should have the Cydia app on your iPhone's screen. Launch the app and select "Manage" from the set of buttons at the bottom of the screen. Tap "Sources," "Edit," then "Add." Type in apt.geohot.com and hit "Add Source" when done. Tap the "done" button and exit out of the "Manage" section.
3. Install Purplesn0w: Do a search for "Purplesn0w" using Cydia's search utility. (Actually, since Cydia updates results as you type, you really only need to enter the first few letters.) You're looking for the package com.geohot.purplesn0w. Once you've found that, tap it to see the details. Next, tap the "Install" button and then the "Confirm" button just as if you were installing any other Cydia app. Wait while it installs and watch for the success message output in Cydia. Tap "Return to Cydia" when it's finished installing and then exit from the Cydia app entirely.
4. Reboot Your iPhone: Press the power button (at the top of the device) until you see the message "slide to power off" appear. Use the slider to power off your device then turn it back on. Once rebooted, your iPhone 3GS will be unlocked.

Note: You can follow the same steps as above to install the ultrasn0w unlock as well, if that's your preference. The only difference is that the repository to add to Cydia is http://repo666.ultrasn0w.com and, obviously, you'll be looking for the ultrasn0w app to install.