US Military Issuing iPod Touches To Soldiers 323
644bd346996 writes "Newsweek has an article about the latest weapons in the US military's arsenal. The iPod Touch and the iPhone are being adapted as general purpose handhelds for soldiers in the field. 'Apple gadgets are proving to be surprisingly versatile. Software developers and the US Department of Defense are developing military software for iPods that enables soldiers to display aerial video from drones and have teleconferences with intelligence agents halfway across the globe. Snipers in Iraq and Afghanistan now use a "ballistics calculator" called BulletFlight, made by the Florida firm Knight's Armament for the iPod Touch and iPhone. Army researchers are developing applications to turn an iPod into a remote control for a bomb-disposal robot (tilting the iPod steers the robot). In Sudan, American military observers are using iPods to learn the appropriate etiquette for interacting with tribal leaders.'"
The real question is.... (Score:5, Insightful)
The real question is: are the military funded applications sold through the Appstore? Or is the US army jail breaking their phones? Or is Apple providing the military special unlocked iPhones?
Perhaps Apple should consider rerunning their 'think different' campaign - this time with a sniper rather than Ghandi.
Re:The real question is.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, I'd bet that Apple are providing the military with special phones that are locked to an "Apps Depot" where the military can make available special apps they've sanctioned. You don't want a piece of military hardware able to run any old dodgy thing sold through the app store, and you equally don't want the machine unlocked and potentially vulnerable when the soldiers install the latest piece of iPorn for Unlocked Phones that hits the bazaars. Remember the pirate DVDs/VCDs with viruses and rootkits and all kinds of other goodness on them that went through military laptops a while back?
Re:The EULA (Score:4, Insightful)
I doubt that US law prohibits the military from developing missiles.
Re:Great idea (Score:5, Insightful)
A mil spec iPod would be too heavy to move without a Humvee and too expensive to give to anyone under the rank of Captain.
aren't those thing built in China? (Score:5, Insightful)
what could possibly go wrong?
there have been stories about the Chinese sneaking counterfeit chips into military application some of which have made there way into military aircraft.
using a consumer gadget built in china seems like a truly epically bad idea.
Why are they just doing this now? (Score:5, Insightful)
PDAs/Smartphones which have the desired functionality have existed for many years before the iPhone/iPod touch. .NET compact framework is much nicer than developing for the iPhone (background processes, yeah!)
And using C# with the
Re:The real question is.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:aren't those thing built in China? (Score:2, Insightful)
The military would never amount to more than a fraction of a percent of the iPod touch sales, so anybody attempting espionage or sabotage would have to subvert a huge number of iPods in order to have an effect on the military that is distinguishable from the regular failure rate, and the problem would probably be noticed by the general public long before the military was significantly affected.
Re:Great idea (Score:4, Insightful)
If this works out, then somebody can build a mil spec iPod from scratch, but as a demonstration of concept, I don't see anything wrong with it. 10 million teenagers can't be too far wrong...
Re:Hmmm (Score:3, Insightful)
sounds like the average military/government spec to me.
Re:Great idea (Score:4, Insightful)
This. We brought over more personal electronics gear than most people who haven't seen would believe. AND there's PXs on most of the bigger posts that will sell you more. AND Amazon.com ships to APOs (yes we could get to Amazon.com, don't be silly). We brought back more personal electronics gear than we brought over by probably at least an order of magnitude :-). The vast majority of it survived just fine. One guy blew out his X-Box plugging it into the wrong power, and digital camera screens got kinda scratched up from the dust, but in general, consumer spec gear did just fine (iPhones and iPod Touches having glass screens would be a big advantage there. Much harder to scratch).
Now computers... those didn't survive as well. Personal game systems tended to stay in peoples relatively well sealed quarters, so they were mostly fine, but the grit really got into to anything that got taken outside much. Moving parts like hard drives, fans, and CD-ROMs failed a lot on our non-ruggedized laptops. The iPhone/Pods are fairly well sealed, all solid state, and like I said, have glass screens. Get a little plug to put into the ear phone holes and I think they'd have quite a reasonable failure rate.
Re:In other news... (Score:1, Insightful)
Why is this modded funny?
Re:The real question is.... (Score:2, Insightful)
Apple aren't exactly publicing this tho' are they? Guess it won't go down to well with the Gandhi loving, prius driving, latte sipping, Bush hating segment of their user base.
Like Old97 [slashdot.org], I'm another one who thinks Gandhi was a great guy, drinks lattes, despises Bush, drives a small fuel-efficient car, voted for Obama, uses Apple products ... and is a veteran. Infantry and medical in my case, including Desert Storm. Try wrapping your right-wing-chickenhawk, learned-about-the-military-from-FPS-games, Limbaugh-and-Fox-News-addled brain around that one.
Re:The real question is.... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm a Gandhi loving,
There's not many who truly love Gandhi & respect his teachings who see militarisation of an entertainment device as 'great'.
I'm prepared to believe you're the exception to the rule tho'.
Aren't these things made in china? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's interesting. Does it also allow you to lock it down so that only sanctioned apps can go on it, or so that only fully approved updates can be installed? They're the kind of features I'd be looking for if I had to approve the phone or touch for military applications.
Well that sort of depends on what backdoors the chinese firmware creators left in.
Parent has a point.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Although I have nothing wrong in general with items made in another country, I woudl think that military items should be created in the country within which it is issued. Take for example, the recent thing about spys infiltrating the national Grid.
Re:The real question is.... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm a Gandhi loving,
There's not many who truly love Gandhi & respect his teachings who see militarisation of an entertainment device as 'great'.
I don't see that as in consistent. I don't agree that Gandhi's approach works everywhere with everyone under all circumstances. His approach of passive resistance works best when confronting a nation of people who see themselves as civilized and decent so it worked against the British. Martin Luther King used Gandhi's approach in the U.S. and that worked well. If the Irish Catholics' resistance to Britain followed Gandhi instead of the IRA, the troubles would have ended sooner and more easily. If the Palestinians used Gandhi's approach against Israel instead of following the PLO there might now be one secular state where people of all denominations were equal.
I don't think Gandhi would have been successful against Hitler or Stalin or Mao. They would have killed him and moved on. There is a time for fighting.
Re:The real question is.... (Score:4, Insightful)
--Mahatma Gandhi
Re:The real question is.... (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm a Gandhi loving, walking and public transport (though a Prius would be O.K. if I had to drive),
Somewhat offtopic, but the Toyoa Prius - whilst a clever piece of kit - is actually much worse for the planet than a 'normal' small car. Takes more energy to produce than a Hummer, just for starters... Buy a small, locally-produced diesel if you want to save the planet...except you're SOL because Detroit don't make one you'd actually want to buy.
Oh, BTW, before I get flamed to hell, I'm a big believer in our need for alternative energy solutions but...let's get the facts straight.
Re:The real question is.... (Score:2, Insightful)
You're an Obama supporter, but you have a background in intel?
How do you feel knowing he would sell you out for the upper hand in a first-round lawsuit?
Or perhaps your intelligence is merely for your own political safety?
vir prudens non contra ventum mingit