Research In Motion's newest mobile platform, BlackBerry 7, has been officially approved for use by the US Department of Defence, the Waterloo company said today. BB7 has won security certification and specified BlackBerrys are now listed on the department's unified communications approved product list. Those models are the Bold 9900 and 9930, the Torch 9850 and 9860, and the Curve 9360.
read more
Mobile payments are set to go mainstream in the next one to four years and Canada is one of the leaders on this front.
MasterCard recently revealed the MasterCard Mobile Payment Readiness Index, which analyzed the state and adoption of mobile payments across 34 countries worldwide. The Index takes into account three types of mobile payments, which are person to person (P2P), mobile e-commerce (m-commerce), and mobile payments at the point of sale (POS). It also looks at consumer readiness, environment, financial services, infrastructure, mobile commerce clusters, and regulation.
read more
The CBC has reported that cybercrime in Canada is skyrocketing. Canada now ranks second worldwide for hosted phishing sites, according to a five-month study completed by Websense this year.
The number of malicious websites hosted in Canada has also risen by 239%. However, it is a worldwide trend that cybercrime is increasing. Still, Canada remains the sixth worst country overall year-over-year in cybercrime. Contrast that to 2010 where Canada ranked 12th overall.
read more
Toronto-based app developer Bnotions has hired Jenna Hannon as their marketing director.
Jenna was born in Calgary, but was educated at the University of Southern California and has worked there for the past six years. Boasting a background of broadcasting, marketing, and board sports, the self-described "blondest tech geek" is a "perfect addition" to Bnotions, according to the Canadian startup.
read more 
Etsy, the online marketplace for handmade and vintage goods, announced yesterday that it has raised $40 million from its existing VC investors.
This Series F round is on top of $51 million in funding to date and now pegs the company's value at more than $600 million.
What are they going to do with all that money?
Etsy’s chief executive, Chad Dickerson, told the New York Times that the new financing isn't needed to cover operational costs (they've been profitable since 2009) but rather to expand internationally.
read more
Traditional television may have a lot more competition than it used to, but don't count it out yet: it still dominates most media in ad spending, and growth in that category actually remains on the rise. Nielsen reports that television ad spend was up almost 5% in 2011 in the US, reaching more than $70 billion.
Meanwhile, internet ad spending was just 8% of that at $6 billion, and newspapers and magazines combined for only $28 billion. Cable TV ad spending has climbed more than 40% since 2007—a sign that the medium is still alive and healthy.
Television commercials average 28 seconds long. Automotive commercials are by far the most popular in the US—they represent over 14% of all money spent on TV ads. Fast food restaurants make up about 6% of spending.
The question of which Canadian city is most deserving of the title of Silicon Valley North has been hotly debated for many years.
Toronto is Canada's most active ecosystem, according to the Startup Compass, but we all know activity isn't everything.
And if activity isn't everything, should we not look beyond the borders of Canada's major cities like Vancouver and Montreal… perhaps far beyond?
read more
Montreal-based startup FixMeStick has launched what it is calling the first-ever consumer-ready USB device for removing viruses from infected PCs. The Canadian technology company is enabling "everyday users to do what the pros do" by detecting, destroying, and preventing virus infection with a USB device.
read more
The Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival this year utilized technology developed by Montreal's Intellitix to put social media into the hands of attendees. Or wrists, to be exact.
read more
Ottawa's Titus, which specializes in data security and governance solutions, has recently been selected by a number of Canadian federal government departments.
The Treasury Board of Canada, Canadian Department of Finance, Public Safety Canada, Privy Council Office, and FINTRAC (Financial Transactions Reports Analysis Centre of Canada) have all purchased and are in the process of deploying Titus classification solutions to identify and protect sensitive information.
read more