Nuisance calls are a daily annoyance, but without Caller ID it’s difficult to know who’s on the end of the line until you answer it — then it’s too late and you’re stuck talking. Happily, Ofcom recently banned companies from withholding their number while making cold calls.
Here are three ways to block nuisance calls today, plus good news on a free service from BT that will help stop unwanted calls. See also: How to block a number on an iPhone and How to block a number on Android.
Update 16 January 2017: BT has announced a free service — BT Call Protect — that will help its customers avoid nuisance calls. It claims its new service will enable it to divert to a junk voicemail box up to 30 million nuisance calls a week.
BT aims to achieve this through the analysis of huge amounts of live data at its centre in Oswestry in Shropshire to identify rogue numbers – typically those that make enormous numbers of calls – and to add them to a blacklist.
Numbers will also be added to this blacklist when many customers report nuisance calls from the same number, and you can compile your own blacklists which can include individual numbers, withheld numbers and international calls. To add a number simply call 1572 after receiving the unwanted call. This works only after you have signed up for Call Protect, of course.
The great news is that it’s now available and it’s free if you’re a BT customer. All you need to do to enable the service on your line is to click through to www.bt.com/callprotect or call 0800 389 1572. You will have to go through an ordering process, but you’ll need only your BT phone number and postcode to do so: no payment details are required and it is a permanently free service, not a special offer which becomes a paid service after, say, 12 months.
Despite over 17 million domestic phone numbers being registered with the TPS, the government scheme seems to have done little to reduce the number of nuisance calls in my experience. Telemarketing firms are supposed to check this database and avoid calling those numbers.
You can register your number on the TPS but it’s only one step to banish all nuisance calls. Many companies either ignore the rules, or call from outside the UK, meaning the rules don’t apply.
As of May 2016 it is now a lot easier to register your mobile phone number on the TPS, since you can now do so by text message. Simply type TPS followed by your email address to 78070 to register on the official Do Not Call database.
As long as you have a compatible phone, you can ask your telephone provider if it’s possible to display the number of the person calling. BT currently charges £1.75 per month for Caller Display so you can see the number of the person calling, but it’s included for free if you pay for your line rental for 12 months up front. Virgin charges £2.25, but TalkTalk and Sky both offer it for free.
If the number calling is in your phone’s address book then the name appears instead. On the BT handset I was using until recently, international calls were flagged up as exactly that, and since we don’t have any overseas relations (or friends who would call), it’s easy to avoid answering calls from anyone we don’t know.
The main issue with nuisance calls is that even if you know not to answer them, it’s still a pain that you have to listen to the phone ringing at all, or get up and walk to it to find out who’s calling.
It may be possible that your telephone provider will block specific numbers but it will typically cost money, usually a few pounds per month. BT calls this Choose to Refuse, but it also has other ‘calling features’ which include blocking all withheld UK numbers.
That’s where call blockers come in. These are boxes which you plug in-line with your existing landline. I tried one from Amazon — the CPR 1200 — which costs £40. That might sound expensive, but if nuisance calls really bother you it could be well worth it for the peace and quiet.
The box comes with 200 known nuisance numbers already programmed, but you can add a new number simply by pressing the button on top after you answer a call and discover it’s a nuisance or cold caller. (This works only if the number calling is visible via Caller ID, and you need Caller ID for the box to work at all.)
The CPR 1200 also lets you block international calls, withheld or private numbers, and entire area codes. Everything is done using your phone’s keypad, and it comes with a quick-reference sticker so you don’t have to memorise which combinations to press. Since the box is powered from the phone line, it doesn’t need a mains adaptor so is convenient and easy to install.
It can even handle two phone lines and two phone handsets.
An alternative to a separate box is a new phone which has similar features built in. BT’s new BT8500 costs only £35 for existing BT customers, or £50 if you want a second wireless handset. For non-BT customers it’s £60 and £80.
The main handset includes buttons for controlling the built-in answerphone, and synchs its address book with other handsets (there are twin, triple and quad handset packs). When someone calls, the BT8500 answers it and asks the person to state their name. Only then will it ring and alert you. You’ll then hear a message telling you who’s calling and you can choose whether to accept the call only once, always, send it to answerphone or always block it.
Friends and family will automatically get through as long as their number is in your address book. That’s the only slight frustration with the BT8500, as it’s laborious to enter lots of names and numbers via the numberpad. There’s no way to import an address book from an existing phone (or smartphone). However, if you’re lazy, you can just wait until people call and add their numbers that way.
Like the CPR 1200, it also lets you block calls by type so you can tell it to block all international and withheld numbers, and all numbers with a certain area code. It goes a bit further by letting you also block all mobile numbers and payphones, apart from those in your address book of course.
Another nice feature of the BT8500 is Do Not Disturb, which mutes the ringer and LEDs. You can tag certain people as VIPs in the address book, so their calls still get through.

© Source: http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/how-to/digital-home/how-stop-nuisance-calls-bt-text-3584361/
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Shopping can be fun but also harrowing, especially in electronics or shoe stores. You can’t find help or can’t figure out if a specific product is in stock.
In the future, the shopping experience should be much better thanks to technology. The store will recognize you, dig into your shopping habits, and guide you in the right direction. If your favorite product is in the store, retailers will make sure you know through messaging.
That Minority Report-type technology is still many years away but will be possible with the magic of sensors, cameras, and data analytics. But some retailers have an early start: Some furniture stores are already using virtual reality so buyers can preview how furniture will look in a room.
Poking into your shopping habits and recognizing your face may sound too invasive, but retailers are trying to make the shopping experience better. It starts with products like Intel’s Responsive Retail Platform, which can track store inventory and respond to customer needs in real time.
RRP, announced on Monday, includes hardware and software that could take control of inventory and pass on real-time alerts to sales associates and customers in the store about what’s in stock.
For example, if you’re shopping for jeans, RRP could tell you if a particular size is available so you don’t have to shuffle through a stack. Or if you are trying on jeans, you could request a size to be delivered to the fitting room.
RRP includes a range of sensors and a mini desktop-like gateway box with an Intel x86 chip. The sensors, for example, can read RFID tags for real-time inventory checks, with the gateway providing the computing muscle. A large store may need a number of RRP boxes sitting on walls to keep a track of many products in real time. Also packaged with RRP are cloud services for analytics.
Levi Strauss will use RRP to read tags to monitor inventory and issue an alert if jeans are left in dressing rooms or if shelves need to be restocked. The system will also map in-store traffic so the company can analyze what products are selling. The technology will be one piece of an effort to improve logistics at Levi Strauss stores.
The new system is potentially the start of a way for Levi Strauss to make shopping a lot easier at their stores. On entering the store, repeat buyers could be instantly redirected to their jeans of choice, and they may be able to try on jeans through a virtual reality headset.
There are many internet-of-things technologies being used to improve logistics at stores. Revel Systems provides technologies for collection and analysis of real-time store or restaurant intelligence at iPad point-of-sale systems. The Revel technology also helps in registering orders and billing. For restaurants, analytics helps figure out key operational details like how much food to buy on a given day.
Home appliance store Pirch is experimenting with numerous technology to improve the buying experience in its large stores. Salespeople at its Manhattan store carry Surface tablets for inventory, billing, and helping customers find the best product. The store is also looking at virtual reality to help customers visualize rooms and kitchens with specific products.
Intel is establishing a fund of US$100 million for retail technology development. Intel will invest in companies developing compelling technologies for use in stores. The company established a similar $100 million fund for the development of automotive technologies.
The fund and RRP were announced at the National Retail Federation show being held in New York, where Intel CEO Brian Krzanich is expected to give a speech. Intel will also have pop-up environments demonstrating cool shopping experiences based on its technologies.

© Source: http://www.pcworld.com/article/3157876/internet-of-things/shopping-goes-high-tech-and-hassle-free-with-new-intel-technology.html
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Jump straight to our full best power banks chart
Phones get faster every year, but the more powerful they become the less their batteries can keep everything going. And, of course, all batteries will degrade over time. If you need extra battery power for your smartphone , tablet or other USB-powered device, you need a power bank. We’ve rounded up the 20 best portable chargers available in the UK in 2017. Also see: How to charge your smartphone or tablet faster
Depending on what features and capacity you need, a power bank can be anything from a few quid to close to £100. See our pick of the Best Power Bank Deals.
You might assume all power banks are much the same thing, but you would be wrong. You can get compact power banks that will charge your phone once, slightly larger portable chargers that might offer two or three charges, or high-capacity banks that can charge your phone in excess of 10 times!
Working out how many times a power bank will charge your phone depends on more than the mAh rating on the packaging. No power bank is 100 percent energy-efficient, with every portable charger losing power through voltage conversion and heat generated. The industry standard for energy efficiency is between 60- and 70 percent, and if it doesn’t expressly state otherwise on the packaging this is likely what you’ll get. But some of the best power banks can offer as high as 90 percent energy efficiency, which equates to more full charges for your phone.
Power banks can also vary greatly on their inputs and outputs. We’re seeing an increasing number of power banks with support for the latest Quick Charge 3.0 and USB-C standards, and in some cases these are supported on the input as well as the output, making them as fast to refill as they are to charge your phone. Some power banks may offer these in place of or alongside full-size USB, Micro-USB and even Lightning ports — which you choose entirely depends on which connection your phone uses, and for how long you intend to keep that phone until you upgrade. (Most power banks are guaranteed for 500 recharges.)
Typically you will need to carry a Micro-USB cable to charge your power bank, and potentially another cable for charging your phone if it doesn’t use the Micro-USB connection to charge. Some power banks come with carry cables to ease this requirement; others might feature built-in cables and Micro-USB- to Lightning adaptors so all you need throw in your bag is the power bank itself.
We’re starting to see power banks creep on to the market that feature an AC/DC outlet — a plug socket that allows you to plug in much more than USB devices. Unfortunately so far we’ve seen only power banks with the US two-pin plug, and needing to carry around a UK three-pin adaptor makes them less easily portable and feel less convenient.
Another type of power bank builds in solar panels. You might think living in the UK our grey climate would rule out the use of such a device, but even in cloudy conditions these devices can draw some solar power. However, the sunnier the conditions the better they work, so if this is the kind of device you’re after we’d recommend a model with a built in battery that means you will have power for your phone even when it’s dark outside.
Design is important when it comes to choosing a power bank, and some batteries are more compact than others at the same capacity. You can also buy those protected from the elements, but be sure to check whether they are probably waterproof or simply rainproof before leaving them out in the cold.
The ideal power bank is one that’s small enough to slip into a pocket or bag without it weighing you down, but with enough juice to keep your phone going all day long. Something exactly like the Zendure A2 that sits at the top of our chart: it’s fast, it’s compact, it’s got enough power to charge your phone two- to three times, and it has a sufficiently durable casing that you could even run it over in your car.
Nearly all power banks use a series of (typically four) LEDs to show you how much power remains in the device. This is fine for smaller-capacity devices, but when each LED represents two- to three full charges for your phone it can be difficult to see exactly where you are. We favour power banks with built-in LCD screens, though you will usually pay a little more for the privilege. No power bank we’ve tested has a more informative and useful LCD screen than the Omnicharge.
Next we come on to the more advanced features that are useful to have but not always found in cheaper power banks. Passthrough charging is something we always look for, and is the ability to charge a connected smartphone at the same time as the device itself. Some power banks say they support passthrough charging, but will actually prioritise the connected device until its battery is full, all the while trickle-charging the power bank itself with whatever power is going spare, then turn their attention to the bank itself. Others will charge both devices at full-speed at once.
Auto-on and auto-off is another sought after feature, though it’s worth pointing out that sometimes a power bank can support this but your phone won’t. It means you can plug in a phone or tablet to charge and the power bank will instantly begin doing its thing without you pressing any buttons. And when charging is complete it will put itself into standby mode in order to conserve energy.
Some power banks, though it’s an increasingly rare feature, also come with an LED torch that will usually be activated by double-pressing a button somewhere on the casing. We’re not massive fans of the built-in torch, though we do understand it can come in useful in certain situations, such as camping. In most cases, though, the rather weak LED is of little use in all but the darkest conditions.
The input rating is key when it comes to recharging the power bank — the higher is this figure the more quickly it will charge. You’ll usually see a figure in Amps, for instance 1A. You multiply this number by the voltage (5V for USB) to find the rating in Watts. A 1A input can charge at 5W, therefore, but you’d do better to look for a device that can charge at 2A (10W).
Don’t expect to get a USB charger in the box — you can use that which was supplied with your phone or tablet. Do note, however, that a power bank with a 2A (10W) input will not recharge its own battery any faster than one with a 1A (5W) input when used with an underspecified USB charger. The reverse is also true when it comes to charging your devices — a phone that supports only a 1A (5W) input won’t charge faster from a 2A (10W) output. See also: Expert tips on how to charge your phone
The output rating refers to how quickly a power bank will charge your devices. In most cases you’ll find 1A (5W), 2A (10W) and often even 2.5A (12.5W) outputs, the former intended for smartphones and the latter two for tablets or for fast-charging phones that support the feature. (This is not the same as the Qualcomm Quick Charge feature supported by several flagship phones.) You can use either output to charge any USB device — it will draw only the power it needs. However, you might find some tablets — usually iPads — will refuse to charge from lower-specified outputs. Also see: What is Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0?
Increasingly power banks feature clever technology which is often referred to as PowerIQ or similar. This allows the power bank to recognise the type of device you have connected for charging and deliver the optimum amount of power for that device.
If a power bank has several outputs then the maximum total output capacity is key. For example, the LimeFuel Blast Pro L240X has four 2.4A (12W) outputs, but delivers only 4.2A (21W) total output. With four USB devices attached you will find that each charges much more slowly.
No. Recently, some power banks have started hitting the headlines for their apparent ability to charge your phone in five minutes. It sounds preposterous because it is.
What these power banks are actually able to do is refill their own batteries sufficiently within five minutes that they can then fully charge your phone (which is still awesome, but not quite as awesome as how you first read that news). How quickly they can supply that power to your phone depends firstly on how much power they are able to output, and secondly how much power your phone can accept.
As an example, the Simpiz iTron , uses DUBI 1.0 technology to refill its own 9000mAh battery in 18 minutes. If you consider that as 3000mAh per six minutes, it would certainly have enough power to fully charge most phones within five minutes.
When it comes to then transferring that power to your phone, the Simpiz iTron’s fastest output is Quick Charge 2.0. This is incredibly fast, but if you have or will have one of the latest devices that support Quick Charge 3.0, such as the Xiaomi Mi 5 or LG G5, it’s not actually the fastest charge they are able to accept. There are several examples of Quick Charge 3.0 power banks in our round-up below. Also see: Graphene batteries: what you need to know.
Read next: Best new phones coming in 2017
Follow Marie Brewis on Twitter .

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Facebook plans to deploy a tool to deal with fake news in Germany in the coming weeks, after announcing tests of the tool last month.
The move comes after reports that some German politicians wanted to impose fines of thousands of euros for each fake news story disseminated.
The process of identifying fake news will typically begin with a report from a Facebook user. The company is making it easier to report fake news , it said Sunday: Users need only click on the upper right corner of a post to file a report.
Such reports, and other warning signs identified by Facebook, will result in the suspect news report being forwarded to a team of fact-checkers working outside the company. The company has been seeking fact-checking partners since last November. The fact-checkers it works with now have all signed up to the code of principles disseminated by the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) at the Poynter Institute, a Florida-based training center for journalists, Facebook said Sunday.
In Germany, it will work initially work with Correctiv , and hopes to work with other media organizations too. Last week Facebook announced a broader campaign to woo journalists.
If one of Faebook’s fact-checking partners considers a news report to be fake, then the report will be displayed on the site with a label identifying it as untrustworthy.
Facebook won’t stop people sharing such reports, but it will display the warning alongside them, including a link explaining why the warning is attached to that story.
While some fake news stories are disseminated to influence debate, others are circulated to make money. Facebook is cracking down on spammers pretending to be reputable news agencies in order to drive visitors to their sites.
There’s still work to be done on the tool being introduced in Germany, but Facebook intends to put it to work stopping the spread of fake news in other countries too.

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This year is set to be as busy as any other in terms of employment law developments in the UK. Here, we round up the ABC of forthcoming legal and other developments potentially affecting IT departments — and much more besides.
Apprenticeship Levy
For employers that have an annual wage bill of more than £3 million, a new 0.5 per cent levy will be payable from April 2017. These additional funds are intended to be used by the government to contribute to the costs of apprenticeship training. Employers can claim back the levy they have paid if they use it for training apprentices. There will even be some government top-ups available, too — an additional ten pence paid by the government for every £1 paid by the employer. If you are hit by the new levy, which some consider to be a form of taxation, consider whether apprentices can be used in your business so that you can recoup some of this additional cost.
Brexit
At some point in the future the UK looks likely to leave the European Union. How, when and what effect this will have on employment law remains to be seen, but with Article 50 likely to be called before the end of March it is an area that all employers will need to keep an eye on. Radical reforms early on seem unlikely, but there could be some tinkering around the edges, especially in view of some unpopular European case law decisions.
Corporate directors
At the moment, a director of a company can be another company. However, there are plans to change this so that only individuals can be named as a board director. This change was expected to be brought in during October 2016, and while it did not happen them we expect it to be imminently brought in. Companies will want to check their corporate structures to ensure they do not need to make any new appointments as a result of this expected change.
Employment status in the ‘gig’ economy
Following the high-profile case involving Uber drivers, some individuals previously considered «self-employed» will now have to be re-categorised as «workers». This is an important distinction as it means that they will benefit from things like holiday rights and minimum wage entitlements. Although the judgement is under appeal, HMRC is (apparently) making a determined effort to investigate employment status issues because the tax treatment is different for self-employed people and workers. So examine the true legal status of any arrangements that you have in place with contractors to avoid getting caught in the dragnet — or at least be prepared, just in case.
Employment tribunal fees
Fees were introduced in 2013 for all Employment Tribunal claims. However, the lawfulness of this was challenged by the union Unison, with the latest hearing in the long-saga set to be heard in March 2017. Will the government have to do a U-turn on the introduction of the fees?
Gender pay gap reporting
New legislation concerning gender pay data is expected to come into force in April 2017. Organisations employing more than 250 staff will be required to report on the difference between male and female pay levels (including bonuses) in their businesses, with the first report due by April 2018.
Grandparental leave
Mothers and their partners can share parental leave and pay under current legislation to care for their child. The government has also confirmed plans to extend this right to shared leave and pay to include working grandparents too. This is expected to be implemented by 2018, so details should emerge this year. Given the relatively small adoption by men taking family leave it will be interesting to see whether this right proves more popular with grandparents.
Minimum wage
From 1 April 2017, the minimum wage rates will increase. Staff aged 25 and over will need to be paid a minimum of £7.50 per hour (up from £7.20). In addition, the national minimum wage will now be known as the «national living wage». For employees aged 21 to 24 (inclusive), the national minimum wage will increase to £7.05 per hour (up from £6.95) and for those aged 18 to 20 (inclusive), it will increase from £5.55 to £5.60 per hour. For younger workers — 16 and 17 years olds — it will be £4.05 per hour (up from £4.00) and for apprentices, £3.50 (up from £3.40).
Religious attire
Can you ban your employees from wearing a headscarf or other accoutrement related to someone’s religion in the workplace? There has been conflicting case law to date as to whether this could be direct discrimination on grounds of their religious belief, so we await a conclusion to this issue.
Whistleblowing
The code of practice for employers on whistleblowing is being reviewed by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (formerly known as the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills or «BIS»). It is expected that a revised code will be published during 2017.
To conclude…
Employment law continues to move fast. Hopefully the above serves as a useful pointer of the key things to look out for during this coming year.
Katee Dias is a senior solicitor in the employment team at City law firm Goodman Derrick LLP .

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