UK telecoms regulator Ofcom wants to ban inflation-related rises in phone and broadband contracts. Instead, it says any potential mid-contract price rises should be set out in pounds and pence.

A new forecast from research specialists Canalys shows the smartphone market is set to recover next year. Worldwide shipments declined by 12% last year but that decline is expected to slow to 5% this year.

Vodafone Group plc and CK Hutchison Group Telecom Holdings Limited have agreed to combine their UK telecommunication businesses, respectively Vodafone UK and Three UK. The merger will create a large new network operator to compete with Virgin Media O2 and EE.

UK mobile payment service Paym will close on 7th March 2023. The service, which allowed users to make and receive payments using their mobile phone numbers, was launched in 2014.

Consumer protection organisation Which? has been given permission by the UK's Competition Appeal Tribunal to represent Apple and Samsung smartphone buyers in a legal case against chip manufacturer Qualcomm.

Mark Bridge writes:

Another week, another couple of product announcements from Samsung. There appears to be no stopping them, despite a recent drop in the company’s share price.

This time it’s a couple of tablets – one of which runs both Android and Windows 8 – and a 20 megapixel camera that’s got a 4G-enabled Android device built in.

Mark Bridge writes:

The telecommunications industry was making plenty of headlines last week – but much of it wasn’t particularly upbeat.

The debate about privacy and security continued in the wake of allegations about US agents intercepting internet traffic. Meanwhile, Nokia prepared to make its last Symbian smartphones and Tradedoubler warned that mobile devices were having a negative effect on high-street consumer loyalty.

George Putic of voanews.com writes:

When news broke about U.S. government agencies collecting metadata about its citizens’ Internet and phone communications, many were surprised by its scope. The surveillance covered a vast number of Internet messages and phone calls. The government did not deny the action but pointed out that the collected data contained, not the substance of the communication, but the so-called metadata.

Mark Bridge writes:

There’s been a lot of talk recently about PRISM, which may allow the US National Security Agency - and anyone they choose - to access some of our personal online information if it passes through the USA. It’s unclear exactly what (if anything) is being shared with whom… and given the nature of national security, we may never know.

However, alongside the possibility of governments seeing information we thought was secure, it’s also worth pointing out that we choose to share plenty of online information ourselves.

Mark Bridge writes:

Where did it all go wrong?  When did the mainstream mobile industry start to slide away from innovation and into repetitive nonsense?  For a while I suspected the downloadable ringtone was to blame. Just days after hearing 'Barbie Girl' on the mobile phone of a man from Vodafone Value Added Services in the late 1990s, I'd downloaded a poptastic tune to my own Nokia 2110. Soon, the entire mobile world was focussed on 30-second instrumentals instead of technical innovation. It was the beginning of the end.

We begin this week's programme by looking at Vodafone's acquisition plans in Spain before moving on to discuss universal mobile chargers and 4G roaming.

There's also time to talk about UK mobile coverage, EE's new customer tracking service, contactless transactions and a smartphone camera that can identify objects hidden behind something else.

In our podcast this week we're discussing the new SmartWatch from Sony, talking about Firefox OS smartphones and contemplating Vodafone's partnership with Sainsbury's.

We're also looking at complaint figures, roaming charges, pay as you go pricing, joint ventures, BlackBerry's recent results and the future of Windows Phone.